This Little Light of Mine
by Lisa Von Cooper
Summary: Timmy Turner sacrificed himself to save his friends and is now trapped inside a mysterious being, the Darkness. Naturally, he is terrified, not knowing what it wants to do to him. But the Darkness has a talent for making people come around to its way of thinking. A darker rewrite of "Wishology: The Final Ending".
1. Chapter One: After the Sacrifice

**Author's Note: I watched "Wishology" recently and thought it was a pretty good TV movie. However, I was disappointed by the portrayal of the Darkness and what it was like inside the Darkness. I was expecting an obsessive friendship and the near-adoration of Timmy Turner, similar to W-i-s-s-l-e-r's picture "Love my darkness" on DeviantArt. (Check it out – it's awesome). Instead, all we got was a simulation of boring old Dimmsdale.**

 **So, inspired by W-i-s-s-l-e-r and by the awesome FFN author candlelight, my challenge is essentially to rewrite "The Final Ending" and make it a little darker (pun not intended). That doesn't mean there will be swearing or violence or carnal relations or anything like that. I'm just trying to tell a creepy tale. I hope you like it!**

 **This Little Light of Mine**

Chapter One: After the Sacrifice

Timmy Turner floats in absolute nothingness.

By coming here, he's saved the lives of his friends and family. But twisting his head around, surveying what he's got himself into, it's going to take a lot of work to convince himself that he did the right thing. It doesn't matter if he closes his eyes or keeps them open; the view is the same. A swathe of impenetrable darkness. There is no landscape to speak of, no trees or fields, no houses or skyscrapers. There are no friendly faces looking out for him, or even unfriendly faces scowling and plotting. There is no floor to ground him – all directions are open, and whichever way he moves, he will be lost forever.

He waits for a voice. A reassurance, a threat – he'll take anything. Instead, there is silence. "Hello?" he calls. Too loud! He claps his hand over his mouth. He has disturbed the peace. The Eliminators will come for him!

But nothing happens. No knight in shining armour arrives on a noble steed. No dungeon master pounces on him with a thumbscrew. He is the only living soul around.

Why can't something just happen already? Why can't the Darkness just eat his flesh or drink his blood or break his bones or whatever and get it over and done with? This waiting, this not-knowing, is torture.

Drifting nowhere in particular, the world seems to have slowed to a snail's pace, as has his train of thought. The implications of his decision to fly into the monster's mouth crawl across his mind one by one.

 _Man, it's dark in here._

 _And lonely._

 _I guess this is all there is._

 _No Dimmsdale._

 _No Chester._

 _No A.J._

 _No Mark._

 _No Trixie._

He curls into a ball, hugging his legs. He's suddenly realised how cold it is. The lingering chill prickles at his skin, like a villain hunting him down.

 _No Vicky._

 _No Mr Crocker._

 _No Dark Laser._

 _No Mom._

 _No Dad._

The air is thin. He gasps for oxygen. The sound is swallowed up and goes unheard. No rescuer is coming for him. He knows that now.

 _No Jorgen._

 _No Poof._

 _No Cosmo!_

 _No Wanda!_

 _Just me, all alone in the Darkness, waiting for whatever the heck it wants to do to me…_

It's then that the tears escape. They burn his cheeks, hot with fear. They drip from his chin and vanish into cloudy blackness. It's not right. He's the Chosen One. He's not supposed to burst into tears in the face of danger. He's supposed to be a hero, slaying the dragon, defeating the Bad Guy, coming home to cheering crowds and parades and a shower of rose petals. But when he's suspended in seemingly never-ending murkiness, he doesn't feel very brave. More like a caged dog about to be put to sleep.

He's pretty sure he knows what the Darkness wants. If he's the true Chosen One, then he's the only person in the world who can destroy the Darkness once and for all. Unless the Darkness destroys him first.

He weeps and weeps. Everything about him – his memories, his senses, his wishes – melts into insignificance, except for one fact. He's going to die here. He doesn't know how, but he will die here.

If only he had a chance to say goodbye properly.

"Why are you crying?"

The booming voice spooks Timmy out of his sobbing state. "Who – who's there?" he asks.

"It's only me. The Darkness." The sound is coming from everywhere, omnipresent, echoing through the gloom. "Tell me what's bothering you."

The ten-year-old boy snorts. "Where do I start?" He scrapes the moisture off his face. "I've been attacked by giant robots, I've dragged everyone I love into danger, and now you're going to k-k-k-kill me." He folds his arms. "Excuse me for not being a ray of sunshine."

He swears the Darkness is laughing at him. "You've got a lot of chutzpah for one so young." A concentrated mass of shadow whacks him in the arm, like a friendly punch from a high-school jock. "I like it."

"You do?" Timmy rubs his (slightly sore) arm.

"Of course. You're a remarkable child, Timmy Turner. Kind, witty, cute as a button … I'd very much like to befriend you."

"Really?" So many questions. "You don't want to destroy me?"

"Absolutely not!" The atmosphere seems to ripple with indignation. "Whatever made you think that? Was it the voice? It was the voice, wasn't it? Well, I can always change it. You should have just said."

The Darkness clears its throat – wait, can darkness have a throat? "Testing, testing," it tries again. "Yes, this is preferable; it's feminine, it's high-pitched but not too high-pitched, and best of all, it's English!"

"It wasn't just the voice," Timmy interjects. "You're kind of big and scary-looking. And what's with the robots yelling, 'Eliminate Timmy Turner'?"

A sigh billows the empty space. "I didn't know what I wanted back then," the Darkness explains. "I assumed the Chosen One would be yet another muscular warrior sent to commit me to oblivion, just like all the others. When I sent those robots after you, I was acting out of fear – no, dread – no, self-preservation."

Timmy is quiet. The Darkness continues. "And then I found you, and instead of firing a missile, you sent a brilliant burning light into me. It seared my innards, true, worse than any weapon of mass destruction that had come before it. But once I'd retreated and recovered, I was left with the most beautiful feeling." The Darkness wraps itself around the boy's tiny body, encasing him in a soft cocoon. "I don't know if it's possible to adequately describe it. It was like someone saw my dirty soul and was scrubbing it clean. I was lighter, more carefree than I had been for aeons. Then I experienced an epiphany: 'This is what friends do for each other. They make each other better.' So, no, I don't want to destroy you, Timmy Turner. I need you to be my friend."

The story concluded, Timmy begins to quiver in the Darkness's grip. Is it true? Is this creature really so lonely it wanted to kidnap him? Or is it a tall tale, a plot to lull him into a false sense of security and strike when he least expects it? He gulps. "But I don't know if I-"

"Hush," the smoky entity stops him, placing an almost-skeletal finger to his lips. "I'm sure this must be more than you can comprehend. You need to rest."

He's hit with a sensation of being dragged upstream, fighting against the river's strong current. He can perceive neither his surroundings nor the direction of travel. His eyes think he is standing still, while the rest of his body knows he is moving. The conflict makes him slightly queasy.

After a long period of time, he's released from the cocoon and floating free once more. The sickness in his stomach subsides.

"There's somewhere I want you to be. You'll need to find the hole to get in," the Darkness tells him.

"How? It's pitch black."

"Use your light."

Timmy pats his shirt. Was he carrying a flashlight? Did he have it during the battle on Fridgidarium? That was so long ago, it could have been in another lifetime.

"No, use your inner light."

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"Haven't you looked at yourself?"

He glances down. Evidently not. He's wearing the same grey robes from when he was taken. He knows this because he can see them. They carry a faint white glow, reminding Timmy of the t-shirts in all those commercials for detergent. "Cool," he breathes.

He stretches his arms out and kicks his legs, propelling himself through the haze until he reaches a dark grey barrier blocking his path. His glow emphasises the tiny bubbles and ridges, like a wall covered in crumbling plaster. The surface radiates a balmy heat – at least, it is balmy compared to the surrounding wintry conditions. He pads at the material –

"GAH!"

The whole world shakes.

"Whoa!" Timmy swings his arms and steadies himself before he flies away. "Are you all right?"

The Darkness groans. "Please be careful, Timmy Turner. This is a very sensitive area."

"Gotcha."

The light he emanates grows and grows. A little higher up, a sooty black ring, just big enough for his head, is illuminated. "Hey, I think I found the hole." He's not too keen on going in, though. What's waiting for him? Thousands of eerie posters and dolls with his face on them, just like Tootie's bedroom? A display of chainsaws and axes ready to be used, just like Vicky's bedroom? Whatever's there, if he plays along with the Darkness's wishes now, maybe he'll have more time to think of a plan. And then he might stand a better chance of escape.

Timmy starts to push through the hole – and gets stuck. Maybe it's not big enough after all. He retreats and tries again. "Sorry," he says. He inches forward, scooting about within the opening, conscious of every kick, every arm placement, every head movement. "Sorry," he repeats. "Sorry, sorry, sorry." The Darkness isn't yelping in pain or anything, but he's aware of the need to be nice. He's aware of what the Darkness might do to him.

Timmy bursts through with a pop.

He finds himself in a large, cavernous room, and his glow spreads to reveal its peculiar shape. The walls curve round to form an irregular oval, wider at the top than at the bottom. It is fluffy and lumpy; the entire room could have been moulded from a storm cloud. The ceiling consists of two domes which meet in the middle and dip downward to a sharp point. The floor slopes into the centre like an upside-down hollowed-out cone, similar to a cocktail glass. It is warm and toasty, but also totally empty.

"What is this place?"

"This is my heart, Timmy Turner." Suddenly the unusual shape makes much more sense. "I'm going to keep you here, where you'll be safe. Nothing can penetrate my heart."

"Nothing? What about that hole in the wall?"

"Oh, that. Of course." The heart wobbles, as if the Darkness has two legs and is awkwardly hopping from one to the other. "Your light from the M.A.R.F. concert created that fissure. It struck me and forced me open. It was agony."

Timmy rubs the back of his neck. "Yeah, sorry about that. I just did what Kiss told me to do."

"No need to apologise, Timmy Turner! I told you, it was the best thing that ever happened to me. Well, until you came here yourself." It giggles. Two hands shoot up from the floor and grip his legs. "Come on, time for bed."

"Bed? But I'm not tired."

"You will be." The Darkness pulls him down, down, down, into the cone-shaped floor, nestling him at the very point. Tendrils of grey nebulae crawl over his body, sealing him in.

 _This wasn't part of the plan!_

Panic squeezes Timmy's chest again, stealing his breath. He wriggles and jerks about. He needs to break free. Now. But he can't. The makeshift blanket hugs him tighter, a grip stronger than death. Desperate, he starts to chew, ignoring the Darkness's quiet "Ouch." The mysterious substance tastes horrible, like an old shoe. He spits it out. "Please, let me go," he begs.

"Why? You just got here. For over ten thousand years I have searched high and low for a companion, and now I finally have you here, pressed to my heart, I'm not letting you out of my clutches!" The walls glimmer with a wash of crimson. "We'll be together forever and ever and ever and ever-"

"NO!" Timmy screams. "You can't keep me here forever and ever and ever and ever! I have friends! I have a family – _two_ families! I have a normal life that I was trying to live until _you_ came along! I want to go home!"

"This is your home now."

"No, it's not! This is the heart of a big scary monster! I want my _real_ home! I want Dimmsdale! I wish I was in Dimmsdale and far away from here! I wish I hadn't sacrificed myself to you! I wish someone would rescue me! COSMO! WANDA! _HELP!_ "

A lump rushes down his throat. He gags and chokes, eyes watering. He finally remembers how to breathe, tries to call for help again – and nothing comes out. He has another go. His mouth is moving, but there's no sound. His pupils shrink in fear. What has the Darkness done to him?

"Oh, Timmy Turner. You poor innocent being." This time the voice seems to vibrate from within him. "I should have known. You're so adorable you're probably not used to rejection."

 _What is it talking about?_

The light is fading. The walls are closing in. The spike on the ceiling threatens to pierce his chest.

"It's been a long day," the Darkness adds. "We'll talk more tomorrow. Sleep tight, Timmy Turner."

Dust flies into his face. He blinks rapidly, trying to get it out of his eyes. His vision blurs. He's weakening. So very tired…

 _Come on, don't give up. Fight it. Fight it…_

But the Darkness is taking over him.

 _Must … not … sleep … swarm of lab mice … raining ducks … what?_

Someone is smiling down on him as he fades away.


	2. Chapter Two: Returning to Earth

**Author's Note: Thanks for the lovely review, queenmancilla13! Sorry it's not showing up on FFN – I don't know why that is. Computers, eh? Funny you should mention Tootie…**

 **We're hopping back to Jorgen and the others for now. Enjoy the second chapter!**

Chapter Two: Returning to Earth

Everyone finds themselves in a spot of bother occasionally. Fortunately, once in a blue moon, life throws you an opportunity to get out of a really bad situation. But it's all up to you to take it on, not anyone else. That's how the world works.

Jorgen Von Strangle has blown his opportunity.

The spherical rocket, also known as 'our ticket to retrieving Timmy', smashes into outer space, shrinking until it cannot be seen at all. It leaves behind two boys, a girl, an alien, a babysitter, a teacher, a supervillain, two parents, two godparents and a baby, all of whom are staring at the leader of Fairy World.

"Uh, we probably should have been on that," Mr Turner unhelpfully points out.

"DAGNABBIT!"

Jorgen's cry of irritation rings out across the universe. When it finally fades away, the tension between everyone, including the near-hatred of the muscular fairy, is thick enough to be sliced with a knife. No-one dares to say a word. Except A.J., who pipes up, "So, uh … what do we do now?"

The question flicks a switch. The crowd explodes in a flurry of hysteria.

"We need to stop that evil Darkness!" Trixie wails.

"We need to figure out how this giant wand works!" Dark Laser snaps.

"We need to, like, find the third part of the prophecy!" Mark reminds everyone.

"We need to free the FAIRIES!" Crocker hoots, twitching.

"WE NEED TO SAVE TIMMY!" Wanda screeches, loudest of them all.

The others are silenced once again. The stress shows on their furrowed brows, their pinched faces, their teeth nibbling their bottom lips.

"We need to have some weenies!" Cosmo suddenly suggests. Wanda glares at him. "What? I thought we were still bouncing ideas off each other. Besides, it's never a bad time for a weenie."

"Except now, you dunderhead!" She addresses the rest of the party. "Look, I know this problem is bigger than us. The future of our whole world could be at stake. The Darkness has already had its way once because we were too weak to stop it. It could have its way again. Who's to say it won't demand everything that exists, confident it'll get it, the same way it got Timmy?"

She pauses to let her words sink in. There's an absent-minded mutter of, "Poof, poof," from her baby.

"Timmy is the Chosen One," Wanda continues. "He doesn't know it yet, but he's the only person who truly understands how to fix this. Unless we bring him back and train him, there's no hope for anything else; not this wand, not the prophecy, not Fairy World, not the Darkness being defeated once and for all." She smacks her fist into her palm.

"The pink lady's right," Dark Laser agrees. "That kid is our number-one priority."

"You wanna hear what I think?" Vicky asks.

"No," says Chester.

"We've got a better chance of finding Timmy if we're not stranded and helpless on the Blue Moon of the Vegan Menu or whatever."

"The _Vegon System_ ," Mark corrects her. "And we just lost the rocket, so, like-"

Wanda cuts the Yugopotamian off. "Jorgen? You've got a massive magic wand, haven't you?"

"Uh … yes."

"Then why don't you use it?"

They wait for him to catch on.

The would-be rescuers are surrounded by a cloud of swirling green fairy dust, punctuated by blue sparkles, with the phrase "POOF!" imposed on top. There's a brief sensation of weightlessness, accompanied by a ringing in everyone's ears.

When the dust settles, they are facing a white house with a red roof. The Turners' house. They're on Planet Earth once more.

"Well, that was speedy and simple," Mrs Turner remarks. "How come no-one thought of it earlier?"

Crocker facepalms. "Is there anyone in this group who has the wisdom of a great horned owl and not that of a clothes hamper?" he grumbles.

A.J. clears his throat.

"Why didn't _you_ think of it, then?" Crocker leers.

"Um, to be fair, you don't tend to think straight when your best friend's just been taken from you by a diabolical force."

"I wouldn't know. I don't have any friends."

"Can we please get away from who's as smart as what and focus on searching for the Chosen One?" Jorgan commands. "To the Timmy Cave!"

He yanks the giant lever disguised as the Turners' mailbox. The ground swallows them all up.

The heroes and villains are lowered into a vast cavern of mysterious blue rocks. Navy stalactites tower down from above, sharp and deadly, reminiscent of the canines of a predator. They finally judder to a halt on a thick pillar which is a boring old brown compared to the brilliant blues around it. The site is laden with grey machines and green screens, the biggest screen (taller even than Jorgen) belonging to the Supercomputer. A.J. instantly makes a beeline for it, hops into the swivel chair and starts to type.

"Do you know what you're doing, brainy twerp?" Vicky questions him.

"You said you'd never call me a twerp again."

"I said I'd never call _Timmy_ a twerp again."

"Whatever, it's irrelevant. Right now I'm setting the co-ordinates of the map to cover the whole universe." As he speaks, the black screen is filled with tiny white dots, which could be galaxies or even clusters of galaxies. "That way, we'll have a perfect view and nowhere for the Darkness to hide."

"Except in plain sight," Trixie points out.

A.J. is momentarily stunned silent. He's never had a beautiful girl criticise his reasoning before. "Would you care to elaborate?"

"I'm pretty and popular, so I'm not that smart, but space is actually very dark, isn't it? So the Darkness probably won't even show up on the map."

"I've already thought of that." He spins to face his other best friend. "Chester, remember our Science Fair project about communication satellites? When we put a tracking device in Timmy's hat and followed him around?"

"Oh my gosh, yeah!" Chester cheers. "We creeped him out so much!" His goofy smile fades. "And now I miss him so much."

"Never fear. We'll just log in to the tracking programme to locate Timmy's hat, and Timmy himself will surely not be far behind."

"A.J., you're a genius!" Wanda beams.

"Why, thank you – uh – I never caught your name…"

"Wanda."

"Wanda. It's all set," he adds, louder, gaining the attention of everyone. "Here goes!" He presses a giant green button. His allies gather round.

The screen bursts into life. A red dot imposes itself on the map. The image zooms in rapidly, flying past galaxy clusters, whizzing between individual galaxies, entering the Milky Way, blasting past the stars, leaping into the Solar System. Only here does it slow markedly. It spins around the Earth.

"This is promising," Crocker comments. "He must be closer than we thought."

It starts to zoom in again when it's above the continent of North America. They can see California. Dimmsdale. The Turners' house. The Timmy Cave.

"Wait, what?" A.J. squints at the screen, perplexed. "It thinks the Darkness is right behind me."

"It's in the cave with us!" Mr Turner shrieks. "Who ratted us out? Was it Dinkleberg?" he roars.

"Hey, guys?" Cosmo butts in. "I think I know what the Supercomputer's tracking."

He picks up a pink hat from the back of A.J.'s chair. He waves it about; the red dot on screen shakes. He swings right, then left; the dot copies exactly. He darts a few feet away, hovering over the chasm; the dot also lingers in this most unlikely of places.

"Hey, you're right!" says Wanda.

"What's that?" He re-joins the group. "I was right about something?"

A.J. tugs at his collar, feeling the eyes upon him like daggers. "Oh, yeah. I forgot. He has a lot of identical pink hats."

Vicky rubs her temples. "It's like I always say: Never trust a twerp!"

"This is worse than I anticipated!" Jorgen paces the width of the pillar, pounding the ground with his buff legs. "We've lost the Chosen One, we've lost the Darkness, the fairies are still being guarded by the Eliminators, and we haven't found out what the prophecy wants of us. With a situation like this, Turner could be in even more danger than we thought!"

"NO! NOT MY TIMMY!"

The team searches for the source of the high-pitched wail.

"OW!"

Vicky is crushed by a girl dressed in black and white.

"What's wrong with him?" The girl bounces up, not even sparing a glance at the dazed babysitter. "What's happened to my one true love?"

"An intruder!" Jorgen pulls a yellow device out of his pocket; to the untrained eye, it looks like a spray can. "Say hello to my little friend: Forgeticen!"

"Wait!" Vicky leaps into action and grabs his arm. "That's my sister! She might be our last chance!" She chases after the girl, who is running in circles and wringing her hands and babbling, "Timmy Timmy Timmy Timmy Timmy Timmy Timmy Timmy Timmy…"

"Pull yourself together, Tootie." She yanks one of the girl's pigtails, causing her to shriek and fall on her butt. Vicky kneels beside her. If she wants her help, she'll have to get down to her level, even if she's not used to it. "What are you doing here?"

"I was drawn to this spot by the mention of Timmy's name," Tootie explains. "I can sense when he is in danger. That, and you left the trapdoor open." She points.

They all look up to the sunlight streaming through. A.J.'s hasty press of a button slams it shut.

"Okay, listen up," Vicky begins. "There's this big scary creature called the Darkness, and it looks like a giant whirlpool of – well, darkness. It's been chasing Timmy, but we don't have a clue why. And now he's disappeared right after saving our lives." Tootie starts to chew her nails. "We need to get him back before the Darkness swallows up the whole world."

"Plus," Jorgen butts in, "we've got robots on the loose and an ancient prophecy to decipher. No big deal."

"And Fairy World is also in trouble, I guess."

"Excuse me?"

Tootie has noticed the godparents. "You must be Cosmo and Wanda," she says, waving. "It's nice to meet you at last."

Wanda exchanges a look with her husband. "You know about us?"

"I may have kind of used my military-grade spy equipment to watch you hang out with Timmy," Tootie mumbles quickly.

"What?"

"Nothing, it's not important."

"Does this-?" Wanda addresses Jorgen. "Does this mean we have to leave Timmy forever?"

"You'll have to find him before you can leave him!" he answers.

"Come on, twerpette," Vicky pleads, standing. "You don't like me and I don't like you, but we both like Timmy now, so we need to work together. You understand the guy better than anyone. Where could he be?"

Tootie strokes her chin. "If I'm gonna catch up to Timmy, I need to think like Timmy. Everybody be quiet!" She squeezes her eyes shut. "My name is Timmy Turner," she mimics. "I'm the most handsome boy in the universe and I'm gonna marry Tootie when I grow up and – and I know where he is!" she gasps.

"Where?" Trixie asks, breaking out from the crowd. "Where?" She shakes Tootie's shoulders. " _Where?_ "

"He's … he's trapped." Tootie keeps her cool, keeps her eyes closed. She clenches her fists and strains to sense him, to get the words out. "He's scared. It's a big place … and there's no light. Wait … no, I was right. No light. He's…" Her shoulders tremble. "He's within the Darkness itself."

She opens her eyes and waits for a response.

"We knew that before you came here!" Trixie yells, globs of spit flying into Tootie's face. "Tell us something we don't know!"

"Okay, okay, I'm sorry," the seer backtracks, wiping her mouth. "Do you know he's asleep?"

"Asleep?" Mrs Turner repeats. "At a time like this?"

"But it's not a peaceful sleep," Tootie continues in a monotone. Her own eyelids are heavy, peering into another world. "He's having a nightmare. He's … calling for someone. His heart is racing. I can feel it."

"Who's he calling?" Wanda presses her.

"GHOSTBUSTERS!" Cosmo cries. "Sorry, I couldn't resist."

"Actually, he wants … you guys." Tootie's gaze is directed at the fairy family but seems to pass through them. "He wants his godparents."


	3. Chapter Three: Fairy Tales

**Author's Note: I hope everyone is enjoying this story! Please keep reading and reviewing!**

Chapter Three: Fairy Tales

The Darkness loves to watch Timmy Turner sleep.

It loves the way his nose crinkles. It loves the way his eyelids flutter. It loves the nonsensical noises that slip from his mouth. Strange, though. The Darkness had expected Timmy Turner to be a snorer. And yet he is quiet.

The Darkness has no eyes in the human sense. It is capable of watching the Chosen One from many angles, all at the same time. It has the most complete view of whatever it surveys. Front, side, back … nothing is hidden.

Timmy Turner continues to shine. His blooming brilliance brightens the heart of the Darkness, sending forth his restorative rays. The abomination is cleansed and refreshed by his mere presence.

"This little light of mine," the Darkness whispers to the child. "Look at you. It's been less than twenty-four hours and we already have a deep connection. Poles apart. Big and small. Darkness and light. We go together so perfectly." It sighs.

There is peace at the heart of the Darkness. The very thing it has hoped for but never acquired. Peace. It cannot recall a time it felt like this. The Darkness has known many things. The tingling fear that comes with introducing oneself to strangers. The sudden confusion watching people running away from it. The pain of their weapons, the pain of being cut open and having to sew up the hole, only to be bludgeoned before it can heal. The anger at being driven away and thoroughly rejected. The guilty joy as it gobbles up another planet in manic retaliation. But peace has never been a prominent feature of this behemoth's life.

Until now.

It is perched on the Blue Moon of the Vegon System, like a wart on a nose. What a charming simile! After its persecutors had vanished, it returned and called the rock its home. There is still the small matter of the inactive wand, but the Darkness is not scared. No-one would dare to attack it while someone they love is inside. The risk would be too great; if the "enemy" does not defeat them, their own remorse will. More importantly, there's not another soul to be seen, so the chances of discovery are slim.

The Darkness and Timmy Turner are alone together. The perfect oxymoron.

Was there ever a sweeter little creature? The Darkness finds it hard to believe that another being could look at Timmy Turner and _not_ wish to lock him up in their heart and never let him out. The Darkness want to banish the evil and sadness from Timmy Turner's life. It wants to surround him with goodness and joy. No easy feat for a cold and desolate void, of course, but the Darkness is definitely not a quitter.

More than that, it is certain it will succeed because it has love on its side. It loves Timmy Turner more than anyone else could possibly fathom. "I love you." When it says those words, it heats up from the inside out. "I love you, I love you, I love you." This affection is transforming the accidental brute into something better, something kinder.

And then the atmosphere changes.

Timmy Turner's mouth is wide open, then snaps shut, then gapes open again. There's a grunt, followed by a squeak. He convulses.

The poor boy's having a nightmare. A nightmare, of all things, on the day the Darkness has pulled him from his average life into what promises to be a veritable paradise! Well, this won't do at all. It nudges his shoulder. "No, no, no," Timmy Turner seems to bark. Soon after, much to the Darkness's relief, he calms down and stops moving. For about three seconds.

He screams and sits bolt upright. "SAVE ME!"

"I'm here," the Darkness soothes him. "It's okay, the Darkness is here. You're not alone." It forms two slender arms to hug Timmy Turner and pat his head. It mops the sweat from his forehead. It shudders at the warmth and moisture; this is a foreign substance.

The boy is taking deep breaths and whipping his head from side to side. "Cosmo? Wanda? Poof?"

The Darkness shushes him. "Don't be afraid, my little light. It's just a bad dream." It is practically overflowing with tenderness.

"You're right," Timmy Turner agrees. "I'll wake up soon. Any minute now." He grins with a twitching eye.

If the Darkness could raise an eyebrow, it would. "You _have_ woken up, dear."

"I have?" The grin droops. "You're the Darkness, aren't you?"

"I am."

Timmy Turner closes his eyes. "Help me," he urges softly. "Come back. Please. I wish you were here."

Does he think his captor cannot hear him if he whispers? He is very much mistaken. The Darkness is incredibly receptive. It notices all the things that others do not, usually the mistakes.

"Your wishing cannot help you," it sneers.

"You don't know Cosmo and Wanda. They'll be here soon, and you'll be sorry. You can't wish away true love." For a moment, the youngster's cerulean eyes blaze with bravado. It's as if he truly believes he is the Chosen One.

"You're wrong in at least one respect. I _do_ know Cosmo and Wanda."

"You're bluffing," Timmy Turner scoffs.

"I'm not. I've studied them for years. I thought (foolish wretch!) that I might approach them someday and become one of their many companions. Cosmo in particular seemed quite … innocent, and I believed he was unlikely to have imbibed any great prejudices."

"Again in English, please?"

"I hoped he'd be too stupid to be frightened of me. Roughly two hundred years ago, I plucked up the courage to address them. It was then I learned that, in reality, ignorance can increase one's capacity for fear, not diminish it. They zapped me with their wands and cast me out, as fairies do."

The Darkness has to pause here. "Excuse me." The lightning sizzling its innards is merely a figment of its imagination, a replayed memory, but this does not stop it cringing from the wound. "Why did I begin this story? Oh, yes. I've studied them for years, and I've seen a lot of godchildren come and go."

Timmy Turner waits.

"A _lot_ of godchildren," it repeats. "Do you think it's possible for Cosmo and Wanda to have truly loved all of them? Even the naughty ones? The ones who were a pain in the buttocks? The ones who saw them as slaves?"

Timmy Turner shrugs. "Why does that matter? Right now, they care about me. That's what's important."

"But they stayed with the others, didn't they? And they stayed only because of Da Rules. Because they had to." The Darkness hesitates. "I'm afraid it's the same with you."

"That's a lie!" is Timmy Turner's instant comeback. "They love me! They have a whole room in their castle full of pictures of the good times we've had together!"

"Ah, yes, the Hall of Timmy. I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but they redecorate it for every godchild."

Timmy Turner folds his arms. "Prove it."

A white rectangle shines on the walls of the Darkness's heart. "Just watch these memories."

The rectangle fades to grey. The number 5 appears in a circle, followed by 4, then 3, then 2, just like those old projectors.

The foggy image rattles and crackles. The smiling face of Cosmo slowly comes into focus. "The Hall of Denzel!" he announces to a nerdy kid with black hair, who admires the framed pictures with awe.

"You've gotta be kidding me," Timmy Turner whines. " _Crocker_ got a Hall of Denzel?"

"There's more."

The Darkness scrutinises Timmy Turner as another memory takes over from the first. This time, it starts playing instantly, opening on an identical room, with pictures of the same size in exactly the same places. Everything is the same, except for the child who is the subject of the pictures.

"The Hall of Walt!" Cosmo announces again.

Another memory. Same room, same pictures, different godchild.

"The Hall of Tina!"

"Oh, Cosmo!" the girl coos. "It's simply the best!"

The memories come thick and fast, slipping by as soon as a name is said.

"The Hall of Bill!"

"The Hall of Benjamin!"

"The Hall of Amelia!"

"The Hall of Erg!"

The utterances hit Timmy Turner like punches to the gut.

"The Hall of Megan!"

"The Hall of Artie!"

"The Hall of Googie!"

"The Hall of Heather!"

"Make it stop," the boy beseeches the Darkness.

Finally, Timmy Turner is confronted with the only memory he will have known before now: "The Hall of Timmy!"

The boy jumps up and throws his hat across the heart of the Darkness.

The being is rocked by a spasm at its core. "AAH!" it hollers. "What was that for?" Why are children so cruel?

"I know what you're doing!" the Chosen One shouts in return, hovering at the centre of its heart. "You're trying to turn me against Cosmo and Wanda so I'll stay here with you! Well, it's not gonna happen! Even if I can't escape, they'll still be raising an army to bust me out of here! I'll always trust them, and they're always there for me! They're not gonna let anything happen to me!" His little face is red from trying to convince himself of this.

"They're there for you now, but what about when you're older? When they decide you don't need them anymore? When they fly away and make you forget you ever had them?"

"They – I – we – shut up!"

"You don't have an answer, do you? Because you know it's true. They're going to leave you, Timmy Turner. They're going to abandon you in a big bad world and never come back."

"Stop it. Stop it." But there's no force in the command. Timmy Turner sinks back into the cone, into the bottom of the heart. "It's the nightmare all over again."

The Darkness instantly softens. "What happened? Tell me."

He hugs his knees. "I escaped," he recounts, his voice barely audible. "I got out of here. I was in Dimmsdale again, and I found Cosmo and Wanda. I said, 'Hey, I'm back!' and they just – looked at me." His eyes glisten with unshed tears. "They didn't recognise me. They said they'd never seen me before. Then – then the Eliminators came back. One of them grabbed me and put – put – put a knife at my neck, and do you know what Cosmo and Wanda did?" He laughs bitterly. "They just stood there. They didn't fight back or yell out or anything. They were just gonna stand there and watch me _die_!"

His lips wobble. He breaks down. He shakes uncontrollably as sob after sob wracks his body. His nails dig into his arms, as if the solution is buried under his skin. His wails are high-pitched and wounding. Maybe he is making a wish; it is hard to tell. The tears come one after another, like a raging waterfall that shows no sign of stopping. This woe is long and deep and painful. These are the tears of a child who has lost all hope.

Maybe the Darkness went too far with its doom-mongering.

A crack is beginning to show down the middle of the cavernous heart. It aches so much. The Darkness vowed to banish the sadness from Timmy Turner's life, but it has already reneged on that promise.

And the effect is, quite literally, breaking its heart.

The Darkness sweeps up Timmy Turner's hat and returns it to his head. "There's a phrase I know well," it says. "Every cloud has a silver lining."

Timmy Turner snivels. "And you're gonna try to convince me there's a silver lining here?"

"Ideally, yes." The Darkness would be lying if it said it wasn't nervous. It needs to choose its words carefully. "Fairy magic doesn't last forever. Their duty to you is fleeting, dependent on your age and the level of misery in your life." It caresses his face. "But my love will last forever. It can never fade, only grow. It doesn't rely on you having to put up with an evil babysitter to keep you sad enough for me. On the contrary, I can make you so much happier than your godparents can. I am more powerful than those measly fairies, and when I grant wishes, they will never backfire. And I can also love you more, because I feel more deeply than any other creature. I see everything they don't, and that includes all the wonderful things about you. I know you're sad because you don't have Cosmo and Wanda anymore, but you'll always have me. You are my little light, Timmy Turner. Nothing will change that."

The urchin sniffs. "You're a sweet talker."

"It's all true. Tell me what you want, and I'll make it happen." It waits for Timmy to speak again.

"Oh, great, now I have to find something. I … I think I want to go back to sleep."

"Very well." The Darkness wraps him up again.

"Oh, and Mrs Darkness? Mr Darkness? Someone?"

"You could always call me Dee for short. Pretend I'm a girl called Dee, if you like."

"Okay. Dee?" The Chosen One swallows. "Would you please stop calling me Timmy Turner?"

"That's your name, isn't it?"

"Yeah, but it's so formal. And a little threatening. Just call me Timmy. Everyone else does."

"I shall." Dee wipes a remnant of a tear away from his cheek. "Goodnight, Timmy Tur – whoops, force of habit! Goodnight, Timmy."

"Goodnight, Dee." He shuffles and sags into the cloudy material. Dee keeps watch as he sinks back into his dreaming. She may be earning his trust at last. There's a long way to go before he forgets his old life and commits himself only to her, but this is a start.

"Sleep tight, my little light. Never flicker out."


	4. Chapter Four: The Comforters

**Author's Note: I think FFN has finally sorted out the problem with reviews not showing up – yippee! Please keep reading and reviewing!**

Chapter Four: The Comforters

"Rise and shine, my little light!"

Timmy is jolted from his slumber. There are still some drowsy pink spots dancing before his eyes; he blinks them out.

"Did you sleep better?"

"Yeah." He pauses. He decides not to tell her. "I don't think I had any dreams at all."

"Well, that's better than having another nightmare." Dee plucks Timmy from his makeshift bed. "What shall I conjure for you today?" she asks. "A rollercoaster? A comic book come to life? A normal day of school?" She sniggers. "As if you'd want _that_."

Timmy cocks his head to the side. "How would you get all that stuff?"

"I'd find out where it is, suck it up, and give it to you."

His light grows in hope. "Are we near the Earth, then?"

"Oh, no, no, no. Too many people there. No, we're back on that Blue Moon. It's totally uninhabited, so no-one will locate us. Or steal you."

The glow dims a little. "Oh." He bobs mid-air. "But what if I asked for something from Earth?"

"That's where my acquaintances come in." Dee raises her voice. "All Eliminators gather at the core as soon as possible!"

From Dee's heart, Timmy takes notice of the clanks and whirrs as the automatons speed across the obscurity and gather outside.

"Listen up, everyone," Dee addresses her minions.

Timmy sticks his face out of the hole. His visage is illuminating the long lines of metallic humanoids, stretching back into the gloom. Most have cold green stares, but two eyes in particular, belonging to an Eliminator standing by himself and sporting a leather jacket, glow red. Red for danger. Were all these machines trying to kill him long ago?

"I'm sure you want to know how the acquisition of the Chosen One will affect your jobs. Nothing drastic – it simply means there will be a few changes around here," Dee explains. "Firstly, my name is no longer the Darkness. I am Dee, and you shall call me Dee, and my preferred third-person pronoun is 'she'. Secondly, you are no longer Eliminators. You are … hmm, what's a good word for it? Comforters!"

"Comforters? That's a stupid name!" one rebel heckles her.

"It's not stupid to go for the non-threatening vibe."

"I'm confused," says an Eliminator facing the wrong direction. "We're not destroying Timmy Turner anymore?"

"Of course not!" She turns him around to face the heart. "Timmy Turner is not to be eliminated! I want you to give him whatever he asks for, treat him with respect and love him as if he were your own son."

"But-"

"No buts! And if you disobey me, if you make Timmy cry, if you so much as _think_ of laying a finger on my precious little light … you're going to get it. I don't know what 'it' is, but I hope I never do." She then adds in a more cheerful tone, "So, are we going to be nice to Timmy?"

"This is ridiculous!"

It's the red-eyed one. The self-styled Lead Eliminator. "First you hated him, and now all of a sudden you love him! It doesn't make any sense!"

"Of course it wouldn't – to _you_ ," Dee says with disdain. "You're a robot. You don't understand emotions."

"I understand exasperation!" the Lead Eliminator argues. "Don't you see? This cuteness is an act! He's trying to win you over, to make you think he's a friend, and then he'll use his light powers to obliterate you!"

"My what now?" But no-one notices Timmy.

"Light isn't my foe. It's fantastic. What he did to me at the M.A.R.F. concert was the best thing that ever happened to me in over ten thousand years." A thin finger pokes the Lead Eliminator in the chest. "Why can't you let me be happy?"

"There's no happiness in not being safe. The prophecy says he will destroy you and destroy you he will – unless we get there first. And if you won't do it, I will!"

He dives at the child.

"STAY AWAY!" Timmy screams.

He raises his hands in self-defence.

A blast of energy smacks into the robot.

All are nearly blinded.

When everyone opens their eyes, there is nothing left of the Lead Eliminator except his disembodied, lifeless head.

Dee whistles, impressed. "I think I've just worked out what 'it' is. So, Comforters, I repeat: Are we going to be nice to Timmy?"

This time, the response is unanimous.

"Yep!"

"Absolutely."

"Right."

"Totally clear on that."

"Timmy Turno no eliminato!"

"Excellent," says Dee.

Timmy inspects his now-shaking hands. "What did I do to him?"

Dee flicks the metal head into the twilight, unlikely to be seen again. "You used your inner light to stand up for yourself. Incredible. You never cease to amaze me." She pinches his cheek. "You really are my Chosen One." Something brushes against his forehead, soft as a kiss, and he cringes.

"Anyway," Dee scolds herself, "we ought to get back to business. Does anyone have a question for me?"

"What about Fairy World?" someone at the back chimes in. "Do we still need to keep those guys locked up?"

"Oh, gosh, I'd forgotten about them." Dee considers. "Yes, they must stay where they are. If they're set free, the first thing they'll do is come for my little light. Half of you will go there right now to act as Guards and increase security; the rest of you will stay with me and serve Timmy."

A curtain of midnight divides the Guards from the Comforters. The Guards morph into spacecraft, turn around and dash off, disappearing into the lightless expanse, heading for Fairy World. The Comforters stay where they are. Motionless. What are they waiting for?

"Go on, then," Dee prompts her little light, "tell them what you want. These machines can zip across galaxies in a matter of minutes. They'll bring your favourite things for you in no time."

Timmy's throat is closing up. He should be the expert at wishing for stuff he doesn't need, but today he has absolutely no desires. He's not getting an F from Crocker. He's not being beaten up by Francis. He's not being ignored by Mom and Dad. He's not being chased by an axe-wielding Vicky. What more could he wish for?

Something clicks in his mind. He wishes for the people he thought he hated – the mad teacher, the bully, the negligent parents, the evil babysitter. Because he misses them all. He doesn't know why, but he misses them all.

He wishes for the people he loves. He misses the gang of boys he read comic books with, played video games with, did science projects with. He misses the girl who looks like a model and tastes like cherries, the girl he kissed just before he was snatched away.

And there are three people he misses the most.

He knows what he really needs. _Who_ he really needs. No matter how hard he looks, he cannot find those distinctive shades of green, pink and purple which would reassure him that the dream was a lie, that he hasn't been forsaken, that all this confusion will be over soon.

He still wishes they were here.

But it's futile. Hopeless.

And also not exactly a wish he can share with Dee.

"I, uh … I don't want anything."

"Are you sure, Mr oops-I've-made-a-ton-of-stupid-wishes-and-now-I-ought-to-wish-everything-was-back-to-normal?"

"Touché." Timmy scratches his head. "Let's see." He reels off a list. "I like chocolate chip cookies, the Crimson Chin, Crash Nebula, Chip Skylark-"

"So you basically like anything beginning with C?"

Timmy can't help laughing. "I guess." Does she think they've become so close that they can share such banter?

"Comforters? Bring me everything Timmy just said, and then even more things that begin with C!" Dee directs her servants.

They take off in the blink of an eye, leaving Dee and Timmy alone together once more. The young one slides through the hole, which seems to have grown in size since he entered yesterday. Or maybe he's imagining things.

"What else is there to you?" Timmy asks.

"What do you mean?"

He lies on his back, limbs spread into a star shape, buoyant on nothingness. "You've got a heart. Do you have a brain as well? A stomach? Ears? What's it like being Dee?"

She absent-mindedly spins him horizontally. "There are quite a few layers to me," she admits. "The outer layer, the closest thing I have to a face, is what most people see: the inky black fringes and the swirling vortex of red clouds."

"Uh-huh."

"That's the tunnel to the next layer, which I call my circle of debris."

"Why's that?"

"Simple – all the waste chucked at me over the years collected there. It's suspended in a thin grey fog."

"Is that where my weenies are?"

"Yes, and the boom box, and the roller skates. The Eliminators – sorry, Comforters – live there. They seem to gain more fun from the rubbish than I do. They liked your presents, by the way. They wouldn't shut up about them. I should thank you for giving them something new and exciting to play with."

"They weren't meant to be…" Timmy begins, but he falters. "I mean, you're welcome." Why argue? He's can't exactly get up and go whenever he wants. He might as well try not to make any more enemies.

"The thickest layer is the one we're in now," Dee continues. "It's pitch black and protects my core, my heart. It's easy to misplace something or someone here. I've had to retrieve many a robot in my lifetime. Some are probably still bumbling about in the shadows."

She stops talking and suddenly knocks Timmy upright again. "Hey, what gives?" he asks.

"I don't want you coming here," she says quickly. "Anything could happen. You could crash into an angry Eliminator. You could escape and leave me forever. You could forget the way back to the centre and burst into tears, and you know I hate to see you cry." She's panicking. She coils her tendrils around his arms and sweeps him towards her core. "Get back in my heart. Now!"

"I'm going already!" Timmy snaps. He dips into the centre of the Darkness with a huff. "Happy now?" he asks, folding his arms. He's not sure which is worse: being all by yourself, with no-one answering your pleas for help, or being surrounded by one clingy organism who won't let you do anything outside its gaze.

Then he remembers his dream.

And he has his answer.

And he wishes he could forget that dream again.

"Why so grumpy?" Dee teases him. She stretches his lips into a smile. He lets them droop. She attempts another smile. He smacks her hands away. He's still trying to work out how he feels about her, and the way she swings between sugar-sweet compassion and super-naggy ferocity isn't helping him make his mind up.

It almost reminds him of someone…

But he pushes the memory of her away, blinking furiously.

Dee sighs. "If you're interested in how I work … I have quite a few secret compartments where I pocket the more precious collectibles. I could let you take a peek sometime."

"Are you sure?"

"My goal is to ensure you're always doing something that gives you joy. If exploring and learning more about me would give you joy, I suppose I can't begrudge you that."

Timmy shrugs. "Okay, then. Maybe later."

"I agree. Later. Right now the Comforters are returning."

"Already?"

"I told you they'd have those items for you in no time."

The child lingers near the entrance to the heart, watching the machines line up to hand over their finds. Some hold burlap sacks, some clutch cardboard boxes and a few brandish paper bags.

"What have you got for us?" Dee presses them.

"WHO WANTS CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIES?"

The over-excited Comforter empties his bag into the heart. Hundreds of cookies amble throughout the space, as if they are slow-dancing. Timmy catches one in his mouth just as his tummy rumbles. "Hey, these are good! Really good!" He's soon finished it off. "I didn't realise how hungry I was."

"Only the best cookies will do for my little light." Dee balls the others into one lump to keep them together. "What else do you have?"

A second Comforter, looking slightly more sheepish, approaches. "Yeah, uh, I tried to pilfer a few _Crimson Chin_ comics, but I didn't know which ones you already had, so I kind of got you every issue ever published." He passes dozens of boxes across. "I hope that's all right."

"Are you kidding?" Timmy tears open a container and flicks through the editions, marvelling at tempting covers for crossovers he never knew existed. "I finally have a complete collection! This is awesome!"

"And now," a third Comforter adds, "you've also got the complete boxset of _Crash Nebula_ , on Blu-ray!" He juggles with the seasons to demonstrate. "I was gonna get the DVDs, but like the Dark – I mean, Dee – says, only the best will do for the Chosen One."

"Slight problem," his friend pipes up, staggering with a massive cardboard box. "I don't think the flat-screen TV will fit through the hole."

Timmy giggles, then sighs. "You've got me a lot of great stuff here," he tells the Comforters, trying to keep his voice steady. "Thanks, guys." To his surprise, he's welling up. He has no idea why. It might be because he's starting to believe Dee when she says she loves him and wants him to be happy.

He scratches the corner of his eye. Maybe he could get used to all this pampering.

"Yeah, great, my turn now," says a more impatient Comforter, shoving the others away. "Check this out!" he smirks. "My treat is the best." He reaches into his sack and pushes the slightly dazed new arrival into Dee's heart.

It's a man. Not just any old man – a man with shiny teeth, snazzy sneakers and a distinctive red hat.

"Hey, Timmy! Great to see you again, buddy! Can you tell me where the heck I am?"

Timmy's mouth gapes open.

"You kidnapped Chip Skylark?!"


	5. Chapter Five: Where's Timmy?

**Author's Note: Get ready for the return of Turbo Thunder! Please keep reading and reviewing!**

Chapter Five: Where's Timmy?

The Timmy Cave is disturbingly quiet. Not even the computers dare to make a sound. Mark and A.J. scoured the map of the universe all night, hunting for any sign of the Darkness or of their friend, with little success. Consequently, today, the mood is decidedly grim. The team is no longer a unified whole; it has split off into groups.

Mark keeps an eye on the Supercomputer, barely moving except to turn a dial now and then.

Mrs Turner follows her pacing husband, attempting to convince him that no, she's sure Dinkleberg had nothing to do with this and it would be a bad idea to confront him.

Crocker and Dark Laser compare blueprints and discuss the merits of various weapons that could be used against the Darkness.

Jorgen, Cosmo and Wanda fret for their friends, having poofed back to Fairy World to find the place overrun with Eliminators. They got out of there immediately.

Poof is asleep in a cot, oblivious to the unspoken hopelessness around him.

Trixie, Tootie, Vicky, Chester and A.J. sit cross-legged on the floor, hunched over a hexagonal device. It has been split open down the side and multi-coloured wires spew forth like a volcanic eruption.

"Don't you kids have homes to go to?" Wanda questions them. "You've been here all day. Your parents must be worried."

Trixie's head snaps up. "Hey, you're right! Dad will kill me if I'm not back in time for _The World of Lipgloss_!"

She climbs to her feet, but Tootie grabs her wrist and pulls her down again. "This is a million times more important than the Makeup Channel!" she insists. "The sooner A.J. can fix my Timmy Tracker, the sooner we can hunt my baby down and save him from the Darkness."

" _Your_ baby?" Chester remarks. His comment goes unnoticed.

"I don't need to supervise A.J., do I?" Trixie argues. "He knows more about technology than I do."

"I see." Tootie pushes her glasses up her nose. "Then I guess you were lying when you said you'd do anything to get Timmy back."

"I wasn't! I'll help out where I can! I just can't help with this."

"Then stay and do something else that's useful." Tootie scrutinises the popular girl's short white skirt. "You like fashion, don't you?"

"A little," Trixie shrugs.

"Why don't you design some kickbutt costumes to fight in?"

"And we can poof them into reality!" Cosmo chimes.

"Sure!" Trixie fetches some pencils and paper from a filing cabinet and settles herself at a desk. "Let's see, I can definitely picture Vicky in a black catsuit, or some kind of animal print dress…" She's off in her own little world, muttering to herself, scribbling furiously, switching between colours in a blur.

"She'll sleep tonight." Vicky shakes her head. She turns her attention to A.J. "Hey, brainy twerp, how slow are you working?"

"Vicky," A.J. replies, methodically connecting a red wire to a blue wire, "I can be fast, or I can be right."

"Why not both?"

" _Because you're distracting me!_ " the boy snarls.

The other gang members regard the source of the angry words.

A.J. shakes his head. "Sorry, I'm just … ugh, it's so frustrating! We're all just sitting around begging for a sign from Timmy when we should be in outer space – you know, _doing_ something." He groans and examines the remaining connections to be made. "The good news is, I've gotten rid of the problem, which was the hardest part. All I need to do is put the Timmy Tracker back together and we're set."

"You do that," Vicky encourages him.

None of the other little groups resume their conversations. They were merely putting up a veneer of fearlessness, talking to pretend. Now that A.J. has shattered it, there's no point trying to hide the panic in their eyes.

All of a sudden, Tootie stands, walks over to the edge of the pillar and squints into the middle distance.

"Did you see something?" Chester asks her. "Are you all right?"

"Blue," she mumbles. "Blue."

"You're _still_ trying to reach Timmy?" Vicky rolls her eyes. "Just wait until the Timmy Tracker's up and running. It'll be so much easier."

"I can't wait. I can't shake the feeling that he's blue. No … that he's somewhere blue. A blue planet, maybe?"

"A blue planet?" Trixie pauses, a black pencil in the air. "How many of those are there? There's Neptune, Uranus-"

"Uranus!" Tootie repeats. "That must be it! He's flying up Uranus!"

"He'd better not be!" Vicky jokes.

Jorgen joins the deliberation. "Maybe it's not a blue planet. Maybe it's a blue moon."

Everyone gasps except Tootie, who steps back from the edge. "What do you mean?"

"Of course, you weren't there." Jorgen clears his throat. "The Blue Moon of the Vegon System was where Turner … gave himself up to the Darkness to save us all."

Tootie sniffs. "He's so heroic."

"And romantic," Trixie adds. "That kiss…" She rests her head in her hands. "I'll never forget it."

"Excuse me?" There's a cold blue flicker of jealousy in Tootie's glare. "You kissed him?"

"Well, he kissed me."

"Mm-hmm." Tootie wrinkles her nose. "I'll be keeping an eye on you, missy."

"Hello?" Mark steers the conversation away from the love triangle. "Like, what would the Darkness be doing back on the Blue Moon? Isn't it scared of the second wand?"

"The second wand that was totally ineffective when we tried to use it?" Crocker reminds him.

"It's probably working out the third part of the prophecy," Dark Laser theorises, "and how to prevent it coming true."

"Well, what are we waiting for?" Tootie slots the two halves of the completed Timmy Tracker together. It has two dials, two flashing red lights and the word TIMMY in purple letters on a yellow label. But before she can begin the search, Mark slams a tentacle on the Supercomputer's keyboard. "Have you, like, seen the news? You gotta check this out!"

He turns up the speakers.

"This is Chet Ubetcha with a troubling announcement. Chip Skylark has vanished from his latest concert in Dimmsdale, kidnapped by giant robots right in front of his hysterical fans!"

There's a shot of the singer waxing lyrical about his shiny teeth, before being ambushed and lifted into the sky by – them.

The team doesn't need to hear any more.

They recognise the Eliminators.

And in a matter of seconds, they'll know where they were heading.

…

POOF!

They're back in the star-shaped crater. The Blue Moon of the Vegon System has no signs of intelligent life anywhere: no footprints, no water sources, no candy wrappers. The second wand, a yellow five-pointed star on a thin pale blue pole, appears not to have moved since they left it.

There are still lights twinkling in the sky, which means the Darkness hasn't obliterated them. Yet.

"We don't have time to waste," says Jorgen. "Let's split up. Half of us will go one way and half will go the other, and we'll search the Blue Moon until we meet on the other side. Move quickly!"

He, Crocker, Dark Laser, Mr and Mrs Turner and Cosmo head in one direction. "Here, Darkness, Darkness, Darkness!" Cosmo calls, as if they were chasing after a kitten. Wanda, Poof, Mark, Vicky, Trixie, Tootie, Chester and A.J. set off to scour the other direction.

"Hey, Vicky," Mark whispers to the babysitter, "have I ever told you how hot you are? Like, I don't know if I can focus on finding Timmy 'cause, like, you're so totally pretty."

"Well, _try_ ," Vicky hisses, "'cause this is no time for romance!" She accidently-on-purpose stamps on one of his tentacles.

"What if we're too late?" Trixie sweats. "What if the Darkness knew we were coming and flew away again?"

The Timmy Tracker starts to make a noise. "We haven't missed it. We're getting close," Tootie reports. "I can feel it." At first, the device beeps every three seconds, then every two seconds, then every second, faster and faster and faster until the beeping becomes a long high-pitched buzz.

"Here he is!" Tootie cries, pointing in front of her. She looks up from the Timmy Tracker. "Huh?"

A very unusual woman is the subject of Tootie's point. She is made of only three colours: black, white and red. Her skin is pale as paper and almost luminous. Her jet-black hair is scraped back into a short ponytail. Her crimson t-shirt matches the blob of lipstick adorning her large thin mouth. She has dark, penetrating pupils and blood-red irises.

She reminds everyone of Vicky, only creepier. If such a thing is possible.

"T-T-Timmy?" Trixie stutters. "Is that you?"

The woman blinks. "Who is this 'Timmy' of which you speak? I am the only living being on this moon. That's why I moved here," she adds through narrow eyes.

"Sorry to bother you," Wanda says to the stranger. "We just thought you could help us. Have you seen a big scary whirlpool of darkness anywhere? Goes by the name of 'the Darkness'? Might be accompanied by a very short boy with brown hair and blue eyes and a pink hat?"

The woman strokes her chin. "I presume this boy is the 'Timmy' you're looking for?"

"Exactly!" Trixie blurts out. "Have you seen him? Have you? Have you?" She falls to her knees. "Please, we're desperate here!"

" _Now_ who's the clingy one?" Tootie smiles to herself.

The lady helps Trixie to her feet. "I'm afraid I'm not much use," she shrugs. "No creature matching either description has settled on the Blue Moon the whole time I've been here."

"Bull-" Vicky stops herself. She sees Wanda's disapproving frown and her hands over Poof's ears. "I mean, uh, this can't be right!" She snatches the device from Tootie's hands. "The Timmy Tracker says he's close! Like, violating-the-restraining-order close! What did you do to it, not-so-brainy twerp?" She throws it at him.

"Ow! Nothing!" A.J. insists, rubbing his head. "I _fixed_ the Timmy Tracker!"

"You didn't fix the Timmy Tracker!" Chester lashes out. "You made it worse!"

"Cosmo, you idiot!" Wands snarls. "Sorry, force of habit. A.J., you idiot!"

They advance on the boy, who backs away with his hands up. Poof senses the anger and is close to tears.

"Don't panic!" the woman yelps, coming between A.J. and the mob. "I _did_ see the Darkness – it just didn't settle here. It flew past on its way to…" She pauses. "Well, that I'm not sure of, but I'm confident it was talking to itself about, uh … Boudacia!"

"Boudacia?" Mark repeats. "That's millions of light years away! And, like, the planet where that crazy princess who keeps trying to marry me lives!"

"What was her name again? Mandy?" Wanda tries to remember.

"Man _die_ ," Mark corrects her. "Even her name is terrifying."

"But why would the Darkness go to another planet full of people?" Trixie wonders.

"This must be its master plan," Wanda speculates. "Defeat the Chosen One, the only person who can destroy it, and take advantage of the freedom to consume every planet in the universe, taking control of every living thing. Total Universe Domination. I mean, it's already eaten Yugopotamia."

"Dude, too soon." Mark growls. "As much as I hate Mandie, I don't want her to lose her home planet. Or her family. Not like I did."

He closes his eyes. There's a moment of silence. The woman rubs her stomach and grimaces, taking a step back.

"Hang on a second." Chester's realised something. "That still doesn't explain why the Eliminators took Chip Skylark."

"Timmy likes Chip Skylark," Vicky muses. She clicks her fingers. "Man, the Darkness is sneaky! It's gonna make Timmy so happy he'll believe it's his friend. And then he won't wanna fight it. And then there'll be no-one to stop it seeking Total Universe Domination!"

"We've all worked it out," Tootie pipes up. "We need to track down Timmy and stop the Darkness brainwashing him and eating everything. And to do that, we should do the opposite of whatever the Timmy Tracker says."

"Let's meet the others, and then – TO BOUDACIA!" Vicky cries.

"To find Timmy!" Trixie and Tootie say together.

"And save another planet from destruction!" Wanda joins in. She shakes the stranger's hand vigorously. "Thanks for everything. We'll leave you in peace now."

They stride off with a new sense of purpose, the fighters marching in time with each other. "I wish you all the best for your quest," the woman calls after them.

…

Dee watches them go and breathes a sigh of relief. That was close. Too close. She's bought herself some time, at least. But when they reach Boudacia and realise she was lying, they might come back. With a vengeance.

She can't stay here forever. She needs to construct a plan, and fast.

 _Hello? Dee?_

She puts a hand to her chest. She can feel Timmy's presence, feel the heat of his eager little light diffusing throughout her body. It's strengthening her, keeping her alive, like fuel in a car.

 _Timmy! How are you doing in there?_

 _Where did you go?_

 _What do you mean?_

 _I tried to talk to you earlier and you didn't answer._

 _Oh, sorry. I just … I was thinking._

 _What about? And how come it was so secret?_

 _We don't have to share everything, do we? Would you like me to read your mind?_

 _I guess not. Look, Dee, the cookies and comics and_ Crash Nebula _Blu-rays are great, but I'm really not comfortable with having Chip Skylark here._

 _I thought he was your favourite singer._

 _He is, but why kidnap him? Couldn't the Comforters have just brought me all his CDs?_

 _That never occurred to me._

 _You have to put him back on Earth!_

"Ma'am?"

"AAAGH!"

She spins around and elbows the interrupting man in the chest.

"Gah!" He rubs the wound.

"Who do you think you are? Why would you sneak up on me like that? I ought to-"

Dee stops when she sees who she's talking to.

Before her stands an incredibly handsome man. Though his legs are unnaturally thin, he has the toned, bulging muscles on his arms and chest to more than make up for it. They are clad in tight-fitting pink and silver armour. But it's the face that makes her gawp. The beady blue eyes, the long shaggy brown hair, the silly pink hat – it's rather cute. Very playful. And oh-so-familiar.

Could there be _two_ Chosen Ones?

"Who are you?" It takes so much effort to force the words out of her mouth. She's not used to wearing the guise of a human being. Yes. That's why.

"I am Turbo Thunder, the Chosen One!" he replies in a booming voice, flexing his muscles.

"Really?"

"Or, at least, I thought I was." His demeanour completely changes. He crosses one leg in front of the other and stares at the ground.

"My name's the Dar – I mean, Dee. Anna. Deanna. Deanna Nes … bitt. Deanna Nesbitt. But you can call me Dee."

He smirks. "You take a while to say your name."

"I'm not used to talking to other people." She tugs an earlobe. "I'm still getting the hang of it."

"Well, I think you're doing fine," Turbo Thunder reassures her.

"That's good to know." Her cheeks are heating up. Is she blushing? Darkness is not supposed to blush! Curse this human form!

 _Dee? Where are you now?_

"Quiet, you!"

"What?"

"Er, quiet, quiet, you … beast! You sneaky little beast!" Turbo Thunder blinks. Dee trawls her mind for an explanation. "I hate the quiet. I suppose you do, when you're as socially inept as me." She physically smiles, but mentally facepalms.

"Well, if it's a quiet life you hate…" Turbo Thunder hesitates. "How'd you like to be a hero?"

"In what way?"

"I've found something very strange on this Blue Moon. If you live here, maybe you'll recognise it. Maybe you can interpret it for me – and, you know, help me save the universe."


	6. Chapter Six: Turbo Thunder's Discovery

**Author's Note: Remember the part in "The Final Ending" where Turbo Thunder tells Timmy his backstory? I've mixed things up a bit, so he's sharing it with Dee here. I hope you all like the story so far! Please keep reading and reviewing!**

Chapter Six: Turbo Thunder's Discovery

Turbo Thunder sits on the edge of the star-shaped crater and slides into it on his butt. Dee is not far behind. She gets to her feet and examines the wand, from the yellow star on its pale stick to the pile of blue rocks it is set in. She trembles in anticipation. The first wand filled her with a white-hot fire that scorched her entrails but left her in some delirious ecstasy, the likes of which had once been alien to her. What will the second one do to her? Could it unlock an even greater pleasure she never knew capable of existence?

"Are you trying to find out how that giant wand works?" she asks, not letting her voice betray any emotion.

"Yep."

"Let me see." Dee strides over, clambers the pile and yanks at the base. Nothing happens. She tries again, gritting her teeth, pulling with all her might, but the wand doesn't move. "Why, you little-" She jumps down. "It won't budge."

"Yeah, I've tried that eleven times already," says Turbo. "I'm starting to think it's not supposed to budge."

"No?"

"It's supposed to light our way."

Dee clasps her hands together so Turbo can't see them shaking. "How can you be so sure?"

"Look at the tall pillar over there." He points; she follows his finger. "See the small hole near the top?"

"Mm-hmm." She can smell his body odour; he hasn't washed for a few days.

"That could focus the light somewhere and show us where we need to go."

"What light?" Dee scans the sky. "I don't see a shining sun."

"Not yet." He takes her shoulders and twists her around. A little way off is a raised circle with two blocks on top. The blocks are shaped like letters. TT. Turbo Thunder's initials.

"What happens if you tread on the letters?" Dee asks.

"Nothing."

"Nothing?"

"That's the bit I don't get." He steps onto the platform. It doesn't sink under his weight. He jumps up and down. There is still no reaction. He roars and stamps his feet like a toddler having a tantrum. It is followed by an awkward silence.

"You told me you were the Chosen One," Dee recalls. "Why doesn't it respond to you?"

"I don't know." He gets off and hangs his head. "I've been preparing for this moment for aeons and I can't even make the stupid second wand work." He clenches his fists. "WHY NOT?" he bellows. "I fit the prophecy's description! I've even got the same initials! Turbo Thunder! TT!"

Or Timmy Turner…

"Turbo," Dee interrupts his rant. "Are you saying there might be more than one Chosen One?"

He raises an eyebrow and ponders the question before sighing and shaking his head. "I don't know anymore. There was one other guy – but I let him down, and now I can't find him."

It confirms her suspicions.

Dee turns away from Turbo. "Let me think of something." She slides a hand up her body, starting from her thigh, moving up, gliding over her stomach, until she stops at the place her heart is. The place that makes her keep going.

 _Timmy._

Though she closes her human eyes, she sees him again, lifting his head from a comic. _Dee?_

 _I love you._

 _Dee…_

 _I love you so much. I need to tell you more often._ She pictures him before her; she pictures herself hugging him, holding him close. Deep down, where Turbo can't see, she coils herself around the child.

 _Tell me you love me,_ she pleads, squeezing her eyes shut.

 _Excuse me?_

 _Tell me you love me._

 _I…_ There's a gulp. _I…_

 _Tell me. I need to hear the words._ She waits.

 _I … l-love y-you._

He chokes a little on the enormity of the phrase, but Dee doesn't care. She pets him, ruffling his hair, clutching his chest, stoking the fire of her affection. _My precious little light._

He goes limp in her heart, surrendering to her touch, surrendering a piece of himself to the Darkness as a child submits to a parent.

She approaches the mechanism. Dee looks like neither Turbo Thunder nor Timmy Turner. But she has the latter inside her, almost like a part of her. Does that count for something?

She plants her feet on the letters.

The platform sinks.

A low rumble emerges from the rock beneath her.

The stars in the sky merge into streams of light. The Blue Moon is spinning, the crater once bathed in shadow now coming under the gaze of a flaming sun. Both Dee and Turbo squeal and hold on to each other.

Sunlight pierces the hole in the pillar, just as Turbo said it would. The luminous tube lands on Dee's forehead and from there travels down, down, down to her chest. With a tiny nip, lasting just a fraction of a second and making her wince, it reflects off the place her heart should be and hits the pile of rocks supporting the second wand. The whole thing glows in a pink mist for an instant before blasting it outwards with a POP.

A strong breeze picks up. The crater vibrates and pushes downwards into the Blue Moon, through the areas the light cannot reach. The wand is much longer than it appears on the surface. It extends into the core.

"How did you do that?" Turbo yells over the grinding. "You're not a Chosen One! You don't have brown hair or buck teeth or a pink hat!"

"Well, er, deep down, I've always felt like a person with brown hair and buck teeth and a pink hat trapped in someone else's body," Dee replies in a rush.

"That's a crazy coincidence. But with everything else that's happened, I might as well believe it!"

The crater halts and the dust settles.

Turbo and Dee have discovered another world.

The ground is covered in pale green bushes growing dainty pink flowers and yellow star-shaped berries. A mighty waterfall, held up by intricate golden structures, curves around a marble building with a domed roof and a crown-shaped weathervane. Rainbows dart across black mountain peaks, connecting everything.

"Wow," Turbo breathes. "It's like a fairy's paradise here!"

In the corner, half-hidden by trees, is the entrance to a temple. Vines creep across the walls and climb the columns at either side. Each column carries the bust of a boy who looks an awful lot like Timmy, but Dee doesn't stop to inspect them any closer. She practically gallops up the stairs, Turbo right behind her. She needs to know her fate.

She finds three etchings on the purple wall inside. There's Turbo Thunder punching the air. The first wand, the fire wand. The second wand, the wind wand. And –

"There's a _third_ wand?"

Someone has drawn a likeness of Planet Earth, encased it in a cube and stuck a wand in the top like a straw in a juice carton.

"We need more." Turbo rips apart the piles of willow leaves covering the walls. Dee joins in, frantically clawing to scrape the vegetation off. More and more sketches are exposed, including the words below the initial image.

TO END THE DARKNESS WITH THE POWER THRICE

THE LAST WAND LIES INSIDE EARTH'S ICE

"What does it mean?" Dee asks the wall.

"The ice wand completes a magic triad," Turbo explains, pointing to the trail of cave paintings. "When combined with the fire wand on Fairy World and the wind wand here on the Blue Moon, it becomes a triple-powered combination that will emit a gazillion-tonne burst of magic-"

"And that will 'end' the Darkness? What does 'end' mean? Transform it into something else? Or – or kill it?"

"I think the pictures speak for themselves." Turbo and Dee stroll to the farthest end of the temple, where the three wands are lined up and sending forth blue-tinted streams of energy. They merge together and smash into a drawing of a swirling storm cloud, lightning sparking in all directions. There are no more pictures after this, just a blank space.

"That seems like a comprehensive eradication," Dee agrees.

"Looks like the plan is simple," Turbo continues, pacing back along the wall. "We go to the coldest parts of the Earth, find the ice wand and banish the Darkness once and for all."

Dee doesn't like the way his eyes sparkle at the notion of the Darkness's death. _Her_ death. Her mouth is dry. She puts her hand to the wall and traces the path of the magic destroying her. At any other time in her life, she would have gladly embraced the promise of non-existence. It would have meant the end – the end of her struggle for a companion, the end of the warfare and the pain, the end of the corrupting urge to rip apart entire planets and have her revenge. But now she has someone to live for, and that makes all the difference. She listens out for Timmy rocking in her depths. She can just about hear him inhaling and exhaling, breathing the foul black air, breathing _her_. It's enough to show how clearly she needs to stall for time.

"Turbo?" She fiddles with her t-shirt. "Why _do_ you hate the Darkness so much?"

He regards her for a second and guffaws. "You're kidding, right?"

"Not entirely. I have heard the legends – haven't we all? But the majority of people listen to the stories and don't do anything about it." She approaches. "What makes you different? What makes you think you have a chance against that mighty being?"

Turbo perches on a stone; she joins him, sitting cross-legged at his feet. "I have known the fear and sadness of having everything you know snatched away from you by the Darkness." Rose-tinted shutters, closing out the present but letting in the past, descend over his eyes as he begins his tale. "I was just a boy loving life on my home planet, Wonder World. It was a magical place, not unlike Fairy World." He snaps out of the retelling for a moment. "Are you aware of Fairy World?"

"I've had dalliances with them in the past."

"Thank goodness. I haven't spilled the secret to someone who wasn't supposed to know." He returns to his reminiscing. "Anyway, my people had powers, some cool, like heat vision, some kind of … strange, like my father's thunder pits. Ours was a peaceful existence – until that fateful day when the _Darkness_ arrived." He spits out the name as if it is poison in his mouth. "We all saw it rising where the Sun should have been. It was so dark and scary. Thank goodness our peaceful planet had a killer defence system that blasted the crud out of it." His triumphant grin lasts but a second. "Alas, it didn't work. Soon, the Eliminators arrived, and they took away the only love I'd ever known. They took … my family."

He spins around so Dee can only see his back. There's a strange churning in her stomach.

Turbo's voice is gruff. "The force of the Darkness swallowing Wonder World caused it to break apart, and caused me to hurtle alone through space until I safely landed on a deserted pink planet. It was there I swore vengeance upon the Darkness and vowed to train myself and perfect my Wonder powers!"

"Wh-what Wonder powers?"

Turbo stands, turns and raises his arms. Lightning shoots out of his armpits and across the temple, striking the walls of the marble building outside. It crumbles and crashes to the ground. Dee's jaw drops.

"Thunder pits," Turbo announces, surveying the wreckage with pride. "I got them from my father."

"Good grief," she mutters.

But Turbo isn't finished yet. "One day, I received an invitation to a 'Chosen One Competition' in a land called Fairy World. Some fairy elders were seeking outside might in their own quest to crush the Darkness."

"Did you win?"

"I'll put it this way: the other finalists were an ogre with terrible aim, a siren who burned herself to a crisp, and a tap-dancing centaur." Dee snorts. "From the moment they declared me the winner and gave me this awesome suit, I was no longer Pippy Dinglefitz, but Turbo Thunder."

She resists the urge to laugh at his silly name. "What happened next?"

"I perched myself atop the highest peak in the land I had now dubbed Thunder World. I waited for the Darkness to strike again so I could seek my revenge! I waited, and waited, and waited … and then I fell asleep and missed my calling when the Darkness returned so that Timmy Turner had to beat it for me," he concludes quickly under his breath.

"Don't be embarrassed," Dee comforts him. "I'm sure I would have fallen asleep if I had to stand on the highest peak of Thunder World for twelve aeons."

"Actually, it was more like eleven aeons," Turbo grumbles. "The point is, with Timmy being who-knows-where, I need to up my game if the Darkness is to be vanquished. I slept through my destiny once. I'm not going to make the same mistake again."

"Good for you!" Dee cheers. "You go out there and-" She falters with a groan. There is a weight pressing down on her head and shoulders. She has been trying to ignore it. She shouldn't blame herself for Wonder World. It was a different time. She was a different person. They brought it upon themselves, attacking her first. They deserved it. It's all their fault. But trying to deny what she made Turbo Thunder go through – no, what she made young Pippy Dinglefitz go through – only causes the weight to crush her even more.

She clutches her stomach and holds back the vomit.

"Dee?" Turbo kneels. "What's wrong? Talk to me."

With his help, she stands on creaking legs. She takes his hand in hers. "I want to help you, Turbo. I want us to defeat that scourge together." She's breathing heavily. "But first, I need some air."

Dee sprints from the temple, down the steps, over to the crater, climbing the wind wand's pole with sweaty hands and great difficulty. She can vaguely hear Turbo calling for her, begging her not to leave after he's poured his heart out to her, but she closes her ears to him until she reaches the top. She twirls to build momentum, leaps from the pole and lands on the surface of the Blue Moon. She glances behind her to make sure he's not there.

She bursts into her true form, the red vortex raging, the inky fringes spreading their influence through the vacuum of space. She flings herself across the void, racking her brain to remember the location of that day of misery.

Dee is going to right her wrongs. She's going to put Wonder World back where it belongs, and try to do the same for the other planets she's taken on over the centuries.

She's going to show everyone she's not the Bad Guy anymore.


	7. Chapter Seven: Mandie & the Doom-Mongers

**Author's Note: Yes, as well as adding Tootie, I've dragged Princess Mandie into this story. Enjoy this chapter! Please keep reading and reviewing!**

Chapter Seven: Mandie and the Doom-Mongers

The group enters the palace's stark white throne room. A pale blue carpet lined with gold leads to the three chairs where the King, Queen and Princess sit. Led by Jorgen Von Strangle, the heroes approach with a slow respectful gait. Stained glass windows to either side depict some of the Boudacians' past glories, each one more explicit than the last. For this reason, the youngest team members fix their gazes straight ahead.

The Princess sits in the middle throne, glaring at the newcomers with pea-green eyes. She is mostly humanoid in appearance, apart from the straight lavender hair, pointy ears, greenish-yellow skin and butterfly antennae. She wears an extremely short cyan dress, matching knee-high boots and elbow-length gloves, and sparkly triangular earrings. A crystal tiara perches on her head; the glimpses of tape between the jewels indicate that it has been frequently broken and stuck back together.

It's clear that she takes more after her mother than her father. The Queen is only differentiated from her daughter by the wrinkles around her eyes, the waviness of her hair and the glaucous blue shade of her clothes. The King must come from a different species entirely – a species where people have the heads of warthogs and round red eyes. He is naked except for his black boots, gold bangles and bright underpants.

Every member of the royal family is armed, the King holding a rusty old blade, the Queen keeping a gun in her leg holster and the Princess's hand hovering near a flaming sword. They are not to be messed with.

"Your majesties-" Jorgen begins.

"Don't talk to us," the King barks.

This takes them back. Jorgen stands firm. "But we have to-"

"We're giving our daughter some much-needed diplomatic training," the Queen explains. "Please direct all your questions and/or demands at her, and we'll intervene if she screws up."

"Mom, please!" the Princess moans. "I'm not going to screw up!"

"Says the girl who lost our Navy to the Gigglepies," the Queen mutters.

"Don't blame me! They spiked my drink!"

"Well, you should have made one of your ladies-in-waiting taste it first!"

"Forgive me for interrupting this argument," Jorgen butts in, "but we have important intelligence that needs to be delivered immediately. Princess Mandy-"

"It's ManDIE," the Princess corrects him, baring her triangular teeth.

"Princess Mandie, we have reason to believe the Darkness is coming for Boudacia."

"Let's see, the Darkness, the Darkness…" Mandie drums her fingers on the throne's armrests. "Nope, still don't know why I should care." The King grunts and nudges her. "Oh, uh, forgive my rudeness. The Darkness, you say? Please elaborate." She leans forward with a simpering smile, as if she is trying too hard to say, 'Look at me, I'm a good listener.'

"The Darkness is a sentient shadowy void," Jorgen explains. "It is a figure of fear. It has been sporadically attacking and destroying different pockets of the universe for tens of thousands of years."

"Oh, the _Darkness_!" Mandie smacks her thigh. "I remember now! We read a couple of books about it in school! I always thought it was just a fairy tale."

"Oh, it's real, all right," Vicky warns. "And it's coming for your planet."

Mandie squints. "Haven't we met before?"

"We fought over a boy and I kicked your butt, if I recall correctly." The babysitter is smug, until she remembers why they're here. "But forget about that. Right now we're trying to save you. If the Darkness gets here and no-one fights back, it'll chew you up like a chocolate chip cookie. But do you think it'll stop there?"

"Yes."

"WRONG!" Vicky jumps down Mandie's throat. "The Darkness will NOT stop!" She backs up and regards a depiction of Mandie's mother planting a ragged and torn flag in an enemy's chest. "Once it's finished off Boudacia, it'll invade every other planet until this world is nothing but a smoking husk of shattered dreams."

Mandie shifts in her seat, her bravery vanishing. "Strong words. But how do you know the Darkness is back?"

The group parts to reveal Mark at the back.

"Mark?" Mandie jumps to her feet.

"It took Yugopotamia." He scrapes a tentacle along the carpet. "It took my parents."

"No," Mandie chokes. She runs towards him.

"Like, help!" Mark cries.

But instead of attacking, Mandie wraps her arms around him. "Oh, Mark, I'm so sorry." Tears dribble down his helmet.

"Mandie."

At her mother's stern address, the Princess peels herself away and wipes her cheeks. She takes a deep breath and stands tall and majestic. Her head moves from team member to team member, making eye contact with all of them. "We Boudacians are the greatest warrior race in existence," she tells them. "We can't have the Darkness taking over all those realms! That's our job!" She clears her throat. "And, of course, we need to think of the potential casualties!" She returns to the thrones. "What should we do?" she asks her parents.

"What do _you_ think we should do?" the King asks her.

"I say we gather the troops and prepare for battle."

"That's my girl."

…

The air field is full of cyan diamond-shaped pods, each perching on three legs. One or two are surrounded by mechanics taking panels off and tinkering with the controls. Between the bunkers next door, soldiers jog to grab their weapons, a mish-mash of grenades and bazooka guns and double-bladed axes, and then stand around awaiting their orders.

Outside a grey cylindrical bomb shelter, the Queen explains her plan to a Boudacian General in a midnight-coloured blazer laden with medals. "Send the fighter pods out first," she commands her, "because they can hopefully lure the Darkness away from Boudacia. Should they fail to hold it back, the tanks and ground missiles will take over the assault."

"What about an infantry charge?"

"That will be our last resort for when the Darkness is about to eat our kingdom. I want as few people dying as possible."

Inside, the shelter is big enough to hold the Princess and the entire squad of Timmy's friends and enemies. The ridged walls are lined with bunk beds, with everyone either sitting on the bottom bunk or lying on the top one. The exceptions are Mandie and Mark, who pace the length of the bunker hand-in-tentacle.

Shelves of food tins are packed together at one end. Cosmo flits over and picks up a couple of cans. "Creamed Losers?" he reads. "Pickled Prisoners of War? I don't know what these things are, but they sound delicious!"

Mark and Mandie pause by the door. "Let's make a bet," the Princess suggests.

"What kind of bet?"

"If you're right about this, if the Darkness comes for us … I'll leave you alone. I'll accept that we weren't meant to be. I'll stop bombarding you with notes and flowers."

"Sounds awesome! Flowers make me puke."

"And if you're wrong about this…" She smiles with thin black lips. "We have to remarry."

Mark edges away. "No can do, babe. You had your chance and, like, you blew it when you took over my planet and shrunk my friends. Plus, I'm totally right. I've seen it, remember?"

"Oh, I don't doubt you," Mandie purrs. "Except I do. A little. You see, normally before we Boudacians fight, there's a crackle of excitement, like the calm before the storm. I'm not getting that here. Everyone's bored."

"It's not boredom," Jorgen pipes up. "We're expecting the worst."

From this point onwards, all conversation ceases.

The human beings, fairies and aliens wait for the Darkness to come.

And wait.

And wait.

And wait.

…

"Is the Darkness here yet?" asks Cosmo.

"No," says Mandie.

"Is the Darkness here yet?" asks Cosmo.

"No," says Mandie.

"Is the Darkness here yet?" asks Cosmo.

"No," says Mandie.

There's a CRASH right above their heads!

The kids scream.

Mandie snatches her sword, ready for action.

The door squeaks open sheepishly. "Sorry!" the King calls. "I was just testing the grenades." Pause. "They work," he adds. "And so does the shelter."

There's a sigh of relief as the door slams, followed by silence.

For about a minute.

"Is the Darkness here yet?" Cosmo resumes.

"No," says Mandie.

"Is the Darkness here yet?" asks Cosmo.

"No," says Mandie.

This goes on for a while.

…

Twenty-four hours later, the pods, tanks and ground missiles are still in position outside the bunker. Inside, the remnants of a complicated card game are scattered across the floor, long abandoned by the sleeping children. Crocker has resorted to electric shocks from Dark Laser to keep himself awake for when the Darkness comes.

If the Darkness comes.

Is the Darkness coming?

"Well, it's been one whole Earth day, and we haven't been attacked or eaten," Mandie remarks, filing her claws. "Are you sure you didn't get the target wrong?"

"Absolutely sure. I don't understand," says Wanda. "Why would that mysterious unnamed woman on the Blue Moon lie to us?"

"Excuse me?"

There's a mist of tension descending on the shelter. It snakes through the door, cloaking the Princess, making it harder for Wanda to see her.

Mandie suddenly grabs the fairy godmother's t-shirt. "You guys came here to exhaust the Boudacian military and frighten our citizens on the basis of the report of a _mysterious unnamed woman_?" She releases her, and Wanda crashes into Cosmo. "Even I know how stupid that is!"

With all the noise, the children are waking up. "What's going on?" Chester murmurs. "Is the Darkness here yet?"

"For the last time, NO!" Mandie shouts. "It's never gonna get here, because you lied to us! You told us you had 'important intelligence', and what do we get? The ramblings of a lady on a faraway moon, which you guys took as fact!" Her hair bursts into flames. "Game over, Mark! You lose the bet!"

"Relax, babe."

"Relax? RELAX? I guess you're telling me I should stress out, huh? I guess you Yugopotamians mean the opposite of what you say, don't you?"

"We were trying to help!" Mark flings back. "What if we hadn't told you, and we were right, and _you_ were the one watching your parents disappear right in front of you? Huh? Huh?"

Mandie opens her mouth, then closes it. Her hair is back to normal, no longer on fire.

"Yeah, that shut you up." Mark has the last word. "So excuse us for getting here as soon as we could."

Now the truth is out, now everyone understands how wrong they were, the semi-confident expectation is replaced by a fresh bout of fear, so palpable you could reach out and touch it.

Tootie rocks on a bottom bunk, hugging her legs. "I wish Timmy was here. He'd know what to do."

Cosmo raises his wand. It makes a noise not dissimilar to a fart and goes limp. "We're not her godparents," Wanda explains.

"It was worth a shot."

"What's Timmy doing?" Trixie asks from the bunk above Tootie. "What do you see?"

"I see-"

"Hang on, you can sense the location and actions of another person even when they're far away?" Mandie is intrigued. "Is that a human thing?"

"No, it's a true love thing." Tootie shuts her eyes. "I see … I see…"

All the attention is on her.

"I – s-see-" She bursts into tears.

"What is it, honey?" Mrs Turner rushes to her side. "What do you see?"

"I can't!" Tootie wails.

"What?"

"I can't see him! There's an outline, I know he's there, I know he's _alive_ , but I can't see any more!" She struggles to regain control of her breathing. "He's somewhere – but he's getting fainter – like he's – moving out of existence – like he's being – absorbed," she bawls between sobs.

"Uh-oh."

Only Wanda catches the sound. "What is it, Jorgen?"

The attention switches from the crying girl to the leader of the fairies. He tugs at his collar. "What's what? I didn't say anything."

"Yes, you did," Mr Turner disagrees. "You said, 'Uh-oh' when Tootie said Timmy was being absorbed."

Jorgen grunts to himself. "I might as well share what I know." He absent-mindedly pats his legs. "When we've fought the Darkness in the past, we were sometimes able to pull out the fairies that had been trapped inside. But they was always something different about them. Drowsiness. Nausea. Memory loss. Cold skin. Sensitivity to light. And their eyes-" He shudders. "Luckily they all recovered. But then, fairies are strong and magic and heal super-quickly. If a human being was kept in the Darkness for too long … the outcome could be a lot worse."

"No!" Tootie cries. "I won't let that happen to Timmy! I won't let him die!"

"Well, then, what are we waiting for?" Trixie asks. She scrabbles down from the top bunk. "Let's go back to the Blue Moon and find that prophecy or whatever and work it out ourselves. Let's find out how to defeat that monster and save Timmy. Let's do it _now_." She stamps her foot. "We've wasted an entire day. We can't afford any more delays. If the Darkness won't come to us, we'll go to it. Less waiting, more doing, that's what I say!"

"Yeah!" Cheers echo across the shelter. It's become a hive of positive thinking, driven by the desire to fight. They _can_ do this. They _will_ do this. They _must_ do this.

"Where's the Timmy Tracker?" Tootie asks.

The surge of excitement dissipates.

"I thought you had it," A.J. says to Tootie.

"I thought Vicky had it," Tootie says.

"I thought A.J. had it," Vicky says.

"Unbelievable!" Wanda rolls her eyes. "We must have left it on the Blue Moon in all the excitement!"

"All the more reason to go back," Trixie insists.

"I'm going with you!" Mandie declares. "You got me into this mess, so I might as well come along for the ride! Besides," she adds, eyes glittering with cheekiness, "Mark and I have a wedding to plan."

They all disappear in a puff of smoke.


	8. Chapter Eight: Wonder World Remade

**Author's Note: Thanks for the feedback, queenmancilla13! Please keep reading and reviewing!**

Chapter Eight: Wonder World Remade

Dee hovers in the vacant space around the sun. There are other planets orbiting the fireball, but none of them carry any intelligent life. Only one was bestowed with that honour, and she destroyed it long ago.

But that's all about to change.

She has devoured plenty of objects in her lifetime, usually to punish her tormentors or improve the Eliminators' arsenal of weapons. But she has never expelled something of her own free will. She has never tried to complete a solar system, rebuild a realm, give a man a home.

This is going to be interesting.

Dee forces air out through her "mouth". A bicycle escapes and floats away. _There, I know I can do it. Although a bicycle is quite unlike an entire ecosystem._

She searches her compartments, her subconscious, for the vestiges of life she has tried so hard to block from her mind. She finds Wonder World, plucks it out and drags it away from her core with a great effort – it's heavier than she remembered.

She retches, the vortex pulsating, straining to release Turbo's habitat. At first, nothing happens.

And then, all in a rush, she regurgitates every single chunk of Wonder World at once. Gold-coloured nuggets of planet knock each other and burst apart like fireworks.

So begins the most difficult jigsaw puzzle in the universe. Dee catches the stray titbits in her frantically stretching arms. She sticks the wreckage together into a faded golden sphere, straightening out the kinks in the three dusky pink rings, repositioning the five meteor-bedevilled moons. She pushes the hodgepodge into the path of orbit the planet had once quitted. The pressure locks the mounds of earth in place.

She turns back into a human and lands in a park at the edge of a city. She wants to see what she's accomplished.

Wonder World exists again, but it appears quite lifeless. The trees in the park have lost their leaves. The flowers in the window boxes have drooped and shed their petals. The skyscrapers are covered in cobwebs, many marred by broken windows and doors coming off their hinges. The roads are dotted with potholes and junctions are blocked by dented cars.

People move stiffly, almost in a trance, as if they were brought back from the edge of death. Their mental faculties are returning one by one. First, they stand in wide-eyed amazement, dazzled upon perceiving the light. Next, their jaws drop in horror when they survey the desolation. Soon after, they spot a loved one and rush towards them, hugging tightly, shedding a tear or two. Eventually, they release each other and set off together, forging a path through the remains, to search for their home and pick up the pieces of the mess the Darkness has made.

Soon, every family has been reunited. Except for one.

"Pippy?"

That name.

"Pippy! Where are you, boy?"

A husband and wife stagger from one end of the park to another and back again. The husband has greying hair and a lot of flabby fat where he possibly used to have muscles. The wife has long messy blonde locks and is thin to the point of emaciation. Both wear the same shade of blue, with the image of a purple lightning bolt on their shirts. Both have eyes that are glazed over with a dirty grey film.

The wife spots Dee leaning on a tree and lurches for her. "Have you seen our Pippy?" she asks her. "Pippy Dinglefitz? He's about this high-" She bends to reach her knees, nearly toppling over. "He has brown hair and blue eyes and buck teeth and he's absolutely adorable and we need him now and…" She cannot say anymore because she has collapsed.

"Let me help you," her husband calls. "Let me…" He falls down beside her. The only parts that are moving are their heaving chests. They are exhausted from the aeons of being preserved in the Darkness. They are no longer used to an ordinary life.

If such a thing is once more possible for them.

Dee blinks back the tears in her eyes, runs away from the city and takes off into space.

One down, who-knows-how-many-more to go.

…

POOF!

The crater is not where it was when they left it. They are underground, confronted by flowers and rainbows and a huge waterfall. Princess Mandie speaks for everyone when she asks, "Where the heck are we?"

Jorgen has spotted the entrance to the temple. "That must be where the third part of the prophecy is! Someone's beaten us to it!" He strides up the steps two at a time, and his co-workers scurry after him.

The wall is covered in curious etchings, and Turbo Thunder is lying on his back for some reason.

"You!" Jorgen barks. "Phony Chosen One! Have you worked out the prophecy?"

"I guess?"

"'I guess'? What does that mean?" Cosmo waves a hand in front of his face. "Hello? Is anyone in there?"

"She just left me here!" Turbo moans. "I poured out my feelings, and she ran away! Where did I go wrong? Why am I so alone?"

"Who was this 'she'?" Wanda demands.

"Deanna Nesbitt," Turbo sighs. "Dee. The most beautiful woman I've ever seen."

"White skin, black hair, red eyes?"

The fighter sits up. "Yeah. That is so spooky."

"I wouldn't pine for her if I were you," Wanda warns. "That 'beautiful woman' misled us and lured us away from the Darkness's true location."

"What does the prophecy say?" Jorgen asks, changing the subject. "Is it any help?"

"Um – there's an ice wand somewhere on Planet Earth," Turbo informs them. "When we find it and combine it with the other two wands, it'll obliterate the Darkness for good."

"Well, that's settled. TO EARTH!" Crocker blasts.

"Not yet!" Tootie cries. "We have to pick up the Timmy Tracker first!"

"Way ahead of you, twerpette!" Vicky tosses the machine over the crowd.

"Vicky!" The little sister catches it. "Where did you find it?"

"It was in a bush outside. I just fished it out."

Spinning the dials to navigate the screen, Tootie starts the search for Timmy.

But it's over as soon as it begins. The two red lights flash. A buzz assaults her ears. Big red letters spell IMPOSSIBLE.

"Impossible?" Tootie repeats. She tries again, moving slowly to make sure she does it correctly. It happens again. Flash, buzz, IMPOSSIBLE.

Trixie rolls her eyes. "Man, how many more disasters are we gonna have?"

Tootie tries everything she can think of. She turns it off and on again. She spins the dials this way and that. She hits it and shakes it. Still the readout is the same: flash, buzz, IMPOSSIBLE, flash, buzz, IMPOSSIBLE, flash, buzz, IMPOSSIBLE.

The Timmy Tracker is no longer tracking Timmy.

As far as that device is concerned, Timmy Turner doesn't exist anymore.

…

Through the fissure, Timmy watches the people and places shoot past the heart. Some creatures look like human beings, some resemble giant squid, some have massive insect heads on stick-thin bodies and some cannot be compared to any creature he knows on Earth. The planets are in all the colours of the rainbow and more, including a few colours the child has no name for.

"Hey, Dee. What's going on?"

She retches once more, but doesn't answer him.

"Talk to me!"

He listens out for her sophisticated English accent, but all he picks up is the worst sound of all.

Silence.

He detests the silence. It is cruel to him because it is hypercritical of noise, even a noise as small as the rustle of clothing. Were he to move, to speak, to break the nothingness, the reaction would have the power to snap his bones. _How dare you try to kill me?_ Sound travels further in the silence. Sound travels faster in the silence. And it always comes back to hurt him by going unanswered. It's a cruelty which, though inflicted by Dee unintentionally, nevertheless hangs on his skin like a shroud. It is a painful reminder of the truth that cannot be fought – the truth that no good friend sticks around forever.

Finally, after a full day's work, Dee is finished. Her entire body slackens, as if it has been released from a taut rope of shame that was holding her back. "I think that's all of them."

Timmy kicks the lining of the heart.

"WAUGH!" The shock flings the boy into the air. "Timmy! Don't do that! If you need me, just yell. In fact, yell as much as you want – I almost forgot you were there!"

"Put Chip back."

"Why so curt?"

"Put Chip back," Timmy repeats.

"Young man, you'll catch more flies with honey than vinegar." The stern maternal voice surrounds him, an oppressive force field ready to squash him if he ignores it.

"I'd like you to _please_ put Chip Skylark back on Earth before he's missed," he tries again.

"Very well, Mr Bossy Boots." She sniggers. "Look at us, bickering. We're like an old married couple."

"I want a divorce," Timmy half-jokes.

"Hang on, where is Chip? I thought he was in the centre with you."

"He said he was forced into doing a jam session with the Comforters." He shrugs. "That was hours ago."

"I'll try to persuade them to send him home." There's a muffled command followed by an outbreak of protest. About a minute later, a quiet whoosh echoes through the gloom as the robots depart from the Darkness.

"I'm back!" Dee announces.

The Chosen One dangles at the centre of the heart. "About time," he mutters.

A delicate patch of murkiness skims his face. "Is there a problem, Timmy?"

"Maybe."

"Can I help with it?"

"Yeah, you can, actually." He folds his arms. "How about we have a conversation once in a while?"

"We're conversing right now."

"That's not what I mean. You keep disappearing and reappearing and disappearing again and it's not funny. I thought I was your precious little light. I thought you cared about me. You cared enough to steal me. So why won't you talk to me?" He pinches the bridge of his nose. "I hate this. It's like I'm alone, but I'm not because you're everywhere I look. That's the worst kind of loneliness." The tone of his voice is rising. "I'm too young to be all by myself. I want you to be with me. I need you to look after me. I love you. Don't you love me?"

He claps a hand over his mouth. Did he really just say that? Did he really just tell Dee he loved her?

But he doesn't backtrack. This time, he meant every word he said. He knows it, deep down.

"Of course I love you! I always will!" Dee vows. "I was disappearing only because … because I was trying to get my affairs in order, find a better hiding place, keep us safe. But I shouldn't have been so preoccupied, and I'm sorry for that. I should just appreciate the time I have with you right now." She curls around his waist. "You, my best friend, my salvation, my little light."

Timmy tries to wriggle free, but a few questions stop him.

Where else can he go? Who else can he turn to?

His parents? Before the Chosen One rigmarole they seemed to have forgotten he existed. They barely remembered to take him on vacation with them.

Vicky? She's pure evil. She just wants to kill him lots of times and in many ways.

Cosmo and Wanda? Dee was right. They'll have to ditch him someday, and then he'll be rudderless once more.

The Darkness is not like the others. The Darkness can never die, and she will not let him expire either. The Darkness will not desert him. The Darkness can make him blissfully happy. The Darkness can show him what true love is supposed to feel like.

He stops resisting. He goes limp.

The tendrils of shadow creep down his legs, covering his tiny feet. They twine upwards, wrapping around his chest and over his shoulders, concealing his arms and hands. He is swaddled in Dee's kindness, enveloped by her tender touch. He buries his face in the downy softness of her cloudy form.

The smoky nebulae swirl around his head, filling his ears with sweet music, filling his eyes with blissful visions, filling his nose with calming pungency, filling his mouth with sticky sweetness.

The light is dimming. He smiles. He lets it happen.

He lets the Darkness overwhelm him.


	9. Chapter Nine: The Ice Wand

**Author's Note: We're building up to an epic face-off against the Darkness! Please keep reading and reviewing!**

Chapter Nine: The Ice Wand

To say the Arctic is cold would be an understatement. Even though it's summer and the Sun never sets, the chilly air still bites through the rescuers' flimsy clothing and sends them all shivering.

"W-w-why couldn't the th-th-th-third wand be a s-s-sand wand h-h-hidden in H-H-H-H-Hawaii?" Tootie stutters.

Jorgen lifts his own wand with quivering arms. "M-m-must – c-c-c-conjure – m-m-m-m-more substantial clothing!"

A rusty red cloud of fairy dust descends on the search party. When it dissipates, it leaves behind some very snug coats and cumbersome boots. But just to be sure, Mandie brandishes her flaming sword and the others huddle around it.

"How big is this Arctic place, anyway?" Mark asks. "How much do we, like, have to search?"

"About 5.5 million square miles," Crocker parrots.

The others groan.

"The wand might not even be here," A.J. adds. "It could be in Antarctica, which is also roughly 5.5 million square miles."

The others groan even louder.

"Come on, guys!" Cosmo tries to enliven them. "The glass isn't half empty, it's half full!" He poofs up half a glass of water to demonstrate. It instantly freezes. He slides the lump of ice out. "Snowball fight, anyone?"

Mrs Turner isn't watching the nitwit. She's noticed something else. "Where are the three girls and that hunky superhero?"

"Over here!" Turbo calls. He, Vicky, Trixie and Tootie stand across the water on a rather cramped ice floe. They're snuggled up in fur-lined jackets, so they're thankfully not so far away as to be unaffected by Jorgen's warm spell.

"How did you get all the way over there?" Mrs Turner asks them.

"We don't know," Vicky replies. "We just kind of ended up here."

"Well, we'd better get you-"

Wanda is interrupted by a polar bear bursting through the crowd.

"Whoa! Where did that come from?" Mr Turner exclaims.

The bear dives into the water and swims straight for Turbo and the girls. It clambers onto the platform (which strangely doesn't sink under its immense weight), shakes itself off like a dog and parks itself on its butt. "I have been waiting for you," it says.

Trixie blinks. "Did that bear just talk to us in English?"

"Brilliant!" Turbo cheers. "He must be the Guardian of the ice wand!" He clears his throat. "Sir, we brave warriors, brought together from foreign lands and united by a common goal to vanquish evil, seek your permission to use the ice wand in our goal to save the world from a dastardly threat."

"Are you the Chosen One?" the Guardian asks.

"Yes – I mean, no – I mean, I don't know," Turbo stalls. "Ladies, help me out here."

Tootie steps in front of him. "Technically, the Chosen One isn't here. He's inside the Darkness. But we're acting on his behalf until we can get him out of there and he can take over."

"Eh, close enough," the bear shrugs. He puts on a pair of glasses, takes out a scroll and clears his throat. "From outer moons to distant suns," he reads, "the ice wand grows for the Chosen One!"

He hops off again. The four team members leave their stomachs behind as their tiny floe rises into a majestic pillar. From the shoreline, the others behold the ice wand emerge in awe. It is simplistic, a star on a stick. But it is also glossy, razor-sharp at the edges and much taller than the fire wand and wind wand combined. It could be the most powerful weapon of all.

"Brace yourself," Turbo tells his companions. "With a couple of my thunder claps, this ice wand will join the others of fire and wind and we'll be one step closer to saving Timmy and destroying the Darkness!"

Vicky, Trixie and Tootie stick their fingers in their ears.

He brings his hands together.

The impact send shockwaves across the Arctic. He and the three girls are lifted into the air, but while they are suspended mid-air, Turbo is thrown aside, barging into Crocker as he lands. A column of icy-blue energy gushes from the base of the ice wand and roars into space. It bounces off the fire wand in Fairy World, where a separate yellow ribbon emerges. From there, the new connection hurries to the wind wand on the Blue Moon and sparks a green river of magic.

The multi-coloured rays spiral together into a slim rainbow and hurtle towards Earth.

…

Dee dodges the stream and follows its path to the Arctic.

Of course! The ice wand!

Well, if it's a war they want, it's a war they'll get. She changes her course and swoops around the planet. They'll never get their grubby hands on her prize, not now that he's encased in her depths. Their enterprise is doomed to fail. But the Darkness will not be going down without a fight.

…

Vicky, Trixie and Tootie can only watch as the three surges of energy rain down from the sky, curling to a halt just above the ice wand. It is here that the surges pause and then dart from left to right together, like an amateur actor who fears he has entered at the wrong point. They are searching for the Chosen One that hasn't arrived yet. With a tiny movement, almost like a shrug, they separate again in front of the three girls – and dive into their bodies.

Vicky howls at the top of her lungs. Trixie is completely paralysed. Tootie twitches and convulses uncontrollably.

After five seconds – too long – the girls are dropped back at the top of the ice wand.

"What just happened?" Vicky moans, holding her head and crawling to her feet. "And what is that irritating humming?"

"Oh, thank goodness I'm not the only one," Trixie sighs, using Vicky's sister's head to support herself as she stands.

"Was that it?" Tootie stays sitting and stares at herself, but everything is much the same. "Was _that_ supposed to defeat the Darkness?"

"You stupid prophecy!" Vicky screeches. "Why can't you just say what you mean?"

She bursts into flames.

Trixie and Tootie scream.

The fire disappears; the ground is marred by a sooty starburst. "Huh," is Vicky's response. "That was weird."

Tootie peers over the edge to the freezing water churning below. "How are we gonna get down from here?"

A sudden gust answers her question. They are all quite literally swept off their feet, tearing around the wand like a helter skelter. At the bottom, they knock over Crocker just as he was back on his feet. They hop up and mumble their stunned apologies.

Trixie dusts off her coat. "How did I do that? I just thought about re-joining the others and … we did. In a very scary and roundabout way."

"Don't I get any cool powers?" Tootie whines. She waves her hands together to see if there's any magic there. Snowflakes suddenly burst forth and dance between her palms. Her face lights up. She rounds them into a ball – and chucks it at Cosmo. "Here's that snowball fight you wanted!"

"No fair, I wasn't ready!" he yelps, picking lumps of ice out of his green hair.

Tootie giggles. "This is awesome! Now I can be just like Elsa!"

"If you start singing _Let It Go_ , I will kill you," Vicky threatens her. She examines her nails, and tiny flames swallow up her fingertips like lit matches. "There's something I don't get. Why did the magic fly into us instead of, you know, at the Darkness?"

"Because you three," Turbo theorises, "must be the only ones who can properly use the power."

"So _we're_ the Chosen Ones now?" Vicky finishes. "Who's next, Chester?" She sniggers at her own joke.

"This gives me an idea. Cosmo? Wanda?" Trixie winks. "Time to poof up those costumes I designed."

The godparents are happy to oblige, their wands beginning to glow.

SUPER POOF!

In a flash of black and white, the girls have completely changed.

Vicky is dressed for strength. A shiny black catsuit that covers her whole body. Yellow chest plates, shoulder pads and gauntlets. A yellow belt with the letter V as a buckle. Sturdy walking boots with yellow laces. Red hair held back in its ponytail by a bat-winged clip.

Trixie is dressed for swiftness. A lime-green shirt with long sleeves and the name _Trixie_ written in white cursive on the chest. A perky, khaki, pleated skirt with tight-fitting shorts underneath. Thigh-high lime-green boots with wedge heels. A short white cape. A lime-green headband keeping her long black hair off her face.

Tootie is dressed for a children's party. A silver tiara embedded with sapphires. A sequined dark blue bodice with bouffant sleeves. A pouffy light blue skirt with lots of frilly white layers and the name _Tootie_ sewed into the hem with magenta stitching. White gloves. Dainty, glittery silver slippers. Black hair in pigtails, curled at the ends and supported by white ribbons.

All wear rocket boosters in their shoes and pop-out wings on their backs. All carry miniature versions of the three wands that empowered them.

Vicky is fire. Trixie is wind. Tootie is ice.

Together, they can stop the Darkness.

…

The sign to Fairy World is breaking apart. The pastel buildings erected in cotton candy clouds have been secluded from the outside world by a giant fence. The pattern of wire is not dissimilar to the mesh used in butterfly nets – one of the fairies' few weaknesses. Four black towers stand in the four corners, each one thrumming with robotic Guards.

Grounded fairies, chained to each other and clad in black-and-white prison jumpsuits, push against the giant wooden cog whose purpose has not yet been explained to them.

"Am I the only one who's back aches?" Cupid complains.

"You're the only one who won't shut up about it!" Juandissimo snaps.

One two-storey building stands apart from the rest. The rusty iron door is chained shut and supervised by Guards. A giant sign reads ARMOURY with another below it adding CONFISCATED WANDS STORED HERE.

Around the back wall, Vicky grips the mini-wand in both hands, stretches her arms out in front of her and focuses all her energy through her hands. A blazing tube strikes the grey stone. She curves it round in a circle before kicking the block down. She has burnt a hole in the wall.

She and Trixie reach inside and grab a couple of sacks. "Okay, pretty girl," Vicky tells her, "time to do your thing."

"I'm on it." Trixie activates her rocket boots and zooms to the top of the perimeter fence.

Vicky darts around the wall of the armoury and sends a white-hot flare into the sky. The Guards at the door shout, "Intruder!" and load their guns. "You want me?" the babysitter taunts them. "Come and get me!"

They shoot.

The bullets are incinerated by a ring of fire.

More and more machines hurry to the scene of the conflict. Each one is obscured by smoke until their arms and weapons have been melted.

It's working. It's distracting the Guards and clearing the area. Trixie opens the sacks and pretends the air is full of invisible arms and hands, straining to pick up a wand and pass it to a fairy. "Anyone here who could use some magic?" she calls.

Most of the staffs land in an eager palm (although a few misguided ones hit their owners in the head). With a few flicks of the wrist, the chains that held the fairies down are disappearing one by one.

"We are free!" Juandissimo's chest bursts out of his jumpsuit. "I never get tired of that."

"Well, I do!" Cupid grumbles.

"Come on, everybody, let's tear down these walls!" Trixie orders.

A few well-timed POOFs later, the fences and watchtowers crash through the pink clouds into Giant Bucket of Acid World below, never to be seen again. The sign sparkles with its former glory.

"Hey! They're taking back Fairy World!"

"Seize them!"

The Guards are closing in. One catches Trixie by the foot in his vice-like grip. Another points his gun at her head. She can't think straight. The only defence she can muster is a slight breeze that ruffles her hair. "Help me!" she pleads.

A screen stops the bullet just inches from her face.

"Tootie!"

The geeky ice queen ignores her love rival, instead flinging snowflakes at the first Guard like ninja throwing stars. In one slice, his arm comes apart from his body. Trixie flies to safety, dragging the severed appendage behind her.

A cold spell knocks this injured Guard to the floor, where he is quickly imprisoned in a square cage. Icicles creep down between his limbs, making any movement impossible.

The second Guard is about to pounce. Tootie spins around and blocks the attack with the formation of an iceberg. She growls and pushes it to the very edge of the cloud, where he plummets into Giant Bucket of Acid World.

She dusts off her hands. In the other mini-battles around her, Guards are toppling like dominoes. Juandissimo flattens ten in one go thanks to a herd of stampeding bulls. Cupid fires off his arrows until the machines only have eyes for each other and barely notice when they're being ripped apart.

Yep, they seem to have it covered.

…

Binky sweeps up the last twitching metal corpses. Fairies gather around their saviours outside the Fairy Council building, cheering and tossing roses at their feet.

"Thank you, thank you!" Vicky addresses the crowd, taking a bow. "We've got you out of one mess, but now we're asking for your help so we can do it again. It's about time we had an action-packed showdown!"

"You mean what happened just then _wasn't_ an action-packed showdown?" Cupid challenges her.

"Oh, sure," the teenager backtracks. "But it's gonna be nothing compared to our epic face-off with…" She pauses for dramatic effect. "… _the Darkness_."

…

Dee hovers over Dimmsdale, over Timmy's old home. Lightning crackles in the air. She bristles with determination.

They will _not_ disturb the peace.

They will _not_ extinguish her newfound joy.

They will _not_ end her life.

And they most certainly will NOT snuff out her little light.

…

Timmy is oblivious to the outside world.

He knows nothing of the old way here. No day and no night. No dark and no light. No big and no small. No friends and no enemies. No fast and no slow. No free and no captive. No empty and no full. No young and no old. No good and no evil. No life and no death.

There is only this cosy median between existence and non-existence.

There is only Dee and the security of her grasp.

He is light as a feather, innocent as a baby.


	10. Chapter Ten: An Epic Showdown

**Author's Note: This chapter is going to have quite a bit of action, as opposed to the more slow-paced emotional ones that came before. I hope you all enjoy it! Please keep reading and reviewing!**

Chapter Ten: An Epic Showdown

An unexpected fire drill has left Dimmsdale deserted, and Dee has a sneaking suspicion as to why it's happened.

She senses them before she can see them. The air ripples with energy, with power. The power of the three wands. She lingers in Timmy's old back yard. She thinks of him curled up in her heart, his little light flowing through it, restoring her. Those aggressors cannot be allowed to undo that progress.

It is time for war. It is time for the last great war before she can properly enjoy the eternal peace with her beloved.

Dee rises above the roof of the Chosen One's house. She braces herself to face the marauding army.

On the street in front of her are a trio of kids in fancy dress, clutching tiny models of the three wands.

"Meet the Turbo Sisters!" the redhead with the fire wand announces.

"Here to retrieve the boy we love!" the beauty with the wind wand explains.

"And engineer your demise!" the little one with the ice wand finishes. "Whatever that means."

Three young girls? Is that the best they can do?

Dee laughs. It's a long, booming, witchy cackle, right in their faces, and she can't stop it no matter how hard she tries. At the end, she coughs and splutters, and a spanner falls out. "This is going to be the shortest war ever!" she tells the morons.

By way of proof, three dozen Comforters spill out of her mouth and onto the road. Their arms morph into laser guns.

"Believe me," Dee adds, "I have many more loyal servants waiting to finish you off. So you'd better leave now before you're given a good thrashing."

"Oh, we're not going anywhere," says the beauty.

Thirteen soldiers in camouflage clothing emerge from the bushes. But that's not all. A swarm of fairies rises from the houses behind, the sky blackening due to their sheer numbers.

"And neither are we!" they shout.

The terror paralyses Dee. Why did that adorable boy have to have so many loved ones? Why are they all trying to kill her?

But her concerns are only temporary. Her will to fight has grown, not shrunk. She regurgitates almost all the Comforters she has left in her. "Don't mind me," she reassures the viewers when they curl their lips. "I'm just evening out the odds."

Two sides stare at each other. One is made up of a mish-mash of human beings, aliens and fairies – lots and lots of fairies. The other consists of a troop of machines led by their near-omnipotent commander, the murky abyss that children have nightmares about.

Who will make the first move?

"Give us the boy," Jorgen orders, "and no-one gets hurt."

"Why should I trust you?" Dee sneers. "Why should I do as you say?"

Vicky suddenly hollers, "Because if you don't, you're gonna feel the heat of my fire powers!" She blasts an inferno at the Darkness. It clings to the gloom and licks her innards with forked tongues.

Yet Dee revels in the wounding. It means the Comforters are adapting. The heat explodes from their mouths. Fireballs illuminate the sky, sending screaming fairies scattering with singed wings.

Vicky stares at the carnage, open-mouthed. "Did I say _my_ fire powers? I meant _your_ fire powers."

"Not so confident now, are you?" Dee leers.

"All right, time for Plan B," Trixie declares. "Prepare to be blown away!"

"Trixie, don't!" Tootie cries. "It won't work!"

But it's too late. She's put a whirlwind among the Comforters, propelling them in all directions. While it's still churning, Dee reaches out and sweeps it up. The machines fall to the ground – and then copy Trixie's manoeuvre.

Chaos ensues.

Doors snap off their hinges. Windows shatter. Metal grinds on the road. The gales howl. Fairies smash into the flotsam and jetsam. Bones crack. People scream. It's a cacophony.

By the end of it all, Dimmsdale is left in tatters. Houses have been razed to the ground (except, bizarrely, the Turners' house). The wreckage is piled up in the streets. The core members of the squad pat themselves down, checking for injuries. One in particular is frantic. "Where's my wand?" Jorgen asks.

"Oh, you'd like your wand, would you?" Dee sniggers. "The wand that just so happened to find its way into me?"

The Comforters' guns at the end of their arms turn into black wands. They have magic on their side and they're not afraid to use it.

The enemies are left virtually powerless, so they try a different tactic. Begging. Mr and Mrs Turner drop to their knees before their robotic overlords. "Please, let's stop this madness! Just give us back our son!" the mother beseeches her foe.

"After everything you've done to me? Not in a million years," the Darkness refuses. "Timmy Turner was the first creature in my entire existence to treat me with any semblance of kindness, and I can't let him go or else I'll have no-one. Why do you want him back, anyway? To turn him against me and … and make him murder me? I definitely won't allow that."

"It doesn't have to be that way!" Tootie insists.

"Yes, it does! If you want Timmy, you'll have to go through me! And you nincompoops are clearly not up to the task!"

Tootie surveys the gaping vortex. _You'll have to go through me … that's it!_

She pops her wings out, takes off and flies into the mouth of the Darkness.

"Tootie!" Vicky screeches. "Where do you think you're going?"

…

Left. Right. Over. Under. Tootie flits this way and that as she dodges the remnants of past battles. A few stray robots, quite obviously defunct due to their dents and exposed wires, charge at her. Every time, a giant icicle to the chest stops them in their tracks. This girl is on a mission, and nothing is going to stop her.

And then she reaches the layer of absolute nothingness.

She halts and squints into the obscurity. What was she thinking? There's no way you could find a blue whale in here, never mind a ten-year-old boy. Besides, even if she frees Timmy, how will she spot the way back out?

"Give up, child! You'll never find him!" The Darkness's voice reaches her from everywhere. "You'll never find anything in this swathe of impenetrable obscurity!"

"Except that, genius!" Tootie points.

A heart-shaped grotto emits its overpowering pure white beams. She dashes towards it. Inky tendrils snap around her legs and yank her back. The girl scrapes them off. They freeze at her touch, so she snaps them apart. She blasts away, leaving a trail of coldness behind her so no vines can follow her.

She's reached the core of the Darkness. There's one patch that isn't dazzling her. It's a hole in the heart. Tootie hacks at it with icy claws. The Darkness writhes and yowls, but the girl ignores it. She enters.

There's a ball at the very centre of the heart, glowing brighter than all the rest, so brilliant that Tootie can barely look at it. _There's nowhere else he can be._ She claws at the lining.

"OW! STOP THAT NOW, YOU BRAT!" the Darkness shrieks.

Tootie ignores it, peeling away the layers to expose the lump of flesh underneath. There it is! His chocolate-brown hair comes into view. He has his back to her. She shoves some more of the Darkness aside and yanks him into her lap.

"Timmy?"

It's him, all right. But it's not the Timmy she knows. He's covered in dirt and almost skeletal. He's smiling in his sleep, away with the fairies.

He doesn't look like he's been tortured or abused or anything, but Tootie still has a bad feeling about this. She needs to get him out of there.

…

Peace, warmth, love – these are the facets of his life. There is nothing to do except simply be. There are no feelings besides this sweet bliss. It hangs in his ears, settles in his eyes, lingers on his tongue. It is everywhere. It is everything. It is her. It is him. They are the same. They are bliss.

Occasionally a ghostly memory flickers in the void. A brief hug. A stolen kiss. Enough to keep the smile on his face. Enough to keep the heavenly world in place. He is safe. Safe from what? Why does it matter? This is all there is, and it is nice.

And then it is spoiled.

A piece breaks away. The realm falls apart. Air hits his back. Cold. Too cold.

Hands are everywhere, ripping the sky to shreds, crumbling the ground. He is exposed. He is vulnerable. He is lost.

He cannot open his eyes. They are heavy with longing, longing for the tranquillity of old. Maybe if he ignores the tremor, it'll stop. Maybe the demon will leave him be.

No chance. It clutches him. It pulls him out. It is taking him away. He groggily kicks a leg out. It doesn't have any effect. The monster is clinging on to him. It is hurting him. Why is it hurting him?

A strange noise assaults his ears. A voice. A high-pitched voice, stirring a buried annoyance.

"You're coming home, Timmy! You're coming with me! It's over!"

Who is she? What is she doing to him?

And what's "over"?

…

Dee is upping her game. Since that child escaped with her little light, the heart has darkened considerably. She can't lose him again. She _won't_ lose him again. And she doesn't care how many people are injured in the process of getting him back.

"Return to me now!" she barks to her Comforters. "Throw the girl out, but don't let Timmy leave!"

Tootie overhears the command and picks up speed. It's futile, though. They're already amassing. The lines of beady green eyes seem to stretch on forever.

Her plan was stupid. Her plan is going to backfire. Timmy will be taken back so the Darkness can resume whatever it was doing to him. It will tighten security. She will be attacked by its slaves, or worse.

Her boosters splutter out as her heart is sinking. _I'm sorry, Timmy. I've failed you._

And then it hits her.

She knows the machines are coming for her.

She knows where they're coming from.

She knows where she can leave.

Tootie doesn't stop. She doesn't fly away either. She dives straight at the Comforters, ready for the onslaught.

They try to use Vicky's fire against her, but she cools the air around her. The flames freeze as soon as they start to burn. With her free hand, Tootie shoots out a series of cutting snowflakes. Arms are coming off and heads are rolling. They barely seem to be putting up a fight, no matter how much the Darkness bellows, "STOP THAT THIEF!"

Once she reaches the back of the army, Tootie stops the blitz. She clicks her heels, quickens and follows the line of Comforters, which promises a path to the outside world. She's made it into the circle of debris, which now looks so much more familiar. She retraces her journey through the arrows, grenades and spent missiles.

Not once does she loosen her grip on Timmy, even as he starts smacking her head and back. "Help!" he wails.

"Don't worry, we're almost there," she reassures him. She makes a beeline for the familiar shade of red until it is all around her.

A small patch of blue sky is just about visible. The vortex pulsates and constricts. The patch flickers and shrinks. The jaws are closing!

Tootie clicks her heels again, powering up her rocket boosters even more. She's practically at warp speed. Her face aches, but she's going to make it.

"Get ready to see the light!" she squeals to her one true love.

He shakes his head and lets out an unintelligible cry, thrashing in her grasp.

As Tootie careers out of the tiniest of holes, Timmy is ripped from his paradise.

…

Too hot! Skin burning! Fire! Put out the fire!

"Calm down, Timmy! Stop screaming!"

"We're here now. You're going to be fine."

Lying on his back, on the ground, on asphalt, scorching asphalt. People everywhere, people looking, people touching, stop touching! Screaming – who is screaming? He is screaming. "Get away! Get away!" Hands clasped over his head. _Hide me. Hide me._

"Timmy, relax! We're trying to help you!"

Who is that nag? Why does he feel guilty for screaming? Why is guilt trying to eat him?

"Wanda?" The name is familiar for some reason.

"It's going to be okay, Timmy! Just let us help you. Open your eyes!"

He does. The light! The agony! He shuts his eyes. His hands cover them.

"I can't! It stings!" Too loud, too shrill! He doesn't care. It's the truth.

"Open your eyes!" Again. A different person? Pressure, too much pressure.

"Leave me alone!" _Where's Dee? I need Dee!_

"Turner! Do what she says!" Bulk bearing down. Uh-oh. Scary man!

Head turned away. Arms up, palms open. "Don't hurt me!" he sobs.

"I'm not hurting you – you're hurting yourself! Listen to me! The Darkness is not your friend! It's killing you! Your life is at risk and we need to see what it's done to you so we can save you! So open your eyes – NOW!"

Silence. _You must obey the scary man. Or he will punish you._

"Okay. Okay. I'll try." Rapid breathing. Heart racing. Open. Pain. Shut. _Try again._ Open. Pain. Shut. Fluttering eyelids – less pain, less pain. _You can do this._ The stinging subsides. He forces himself to look around at all the people.

…

The relatives, friends, enemies and fairies all gasp.

"Never in ten thousand years have I seen…" Jorgen doesn't finish his sentence.

Timmy's eyes are completely black.


	11. Chapter Eleven: Rehabilitation

**Author's Note: Sorry for the long absence – I was on holiday with my family! We had a great time, especially when we were playing crazy golf! Now I can access the Internet again, I can get back to writing.**

 **To Grocamol, bbst and queenmancilla13, thanks for the lovely reviews!**

 **After all that excitement in the last chapter, we're back to emotions running high. Enjoy! Please keep reading and reviewing!**

Chapter Eleven: Rehabilitation

Timmy surveys the circle of worried faces, staring back at him with wide eyes and raised eyebrows and hands over gaping mouths. Names and memories are returning to him. He had friends. He had a family – _two_ families. He had a life before the Darkness. But by the looks of it, he won't have one after it.

"What's wrong?" he asks them, sitting up. "What are you looking at?"

Trixie offers him her compact mirror. "Maybe you should see for yourself."

Timmy takes it with a quivering hand. This can't be good if they won't even say it out loud. He gawks at the tiny circle of glass.

It's not him. It can't be.

He touches his cheek. He sticks his tongue out. The reflection copies him exactly. No, it's him, all right.

What's happened to him?

His eyes are black. The pupils, the irises, the so-called whites – all are black, pitch-black. These are the eyes of a ghost, a ghost mourning the loss of its own life.

That's not all. His hair is sprinkled with soot. His white robes are marred by lumpy black squiggles of ink, like leeches out for his blood. He's so skinny you can count the bones beneath his taut grey skin.

The others are waiting for his reaction.

"Am I gonna be okay?"

Silence.

"Of course you are," Wanda replies.

But she took too long to answer, and she knows it.

"Excuse me."

The circle parts. There stands a woman with jet-black hair, blood-red eyes and paper-white skin.

"Deanna?" Turbo gasps.

"That's right." She picks out some grime from under her fingernails. "Deanna Nesbitt, also known as Dee, also known as the Darkness."

There's a collective "WHAAAAA?!"

"You're the Darkness?" Jorgen scratches his head. "You can shapeshift?"

"It's a skill I've only recently acquired. If I could use it before, I would have done. Maybe fewer people would have run away."

The team is appalled.

"You led us off-course!" A.J. complains.

"You destroyed my home!" Turbo roars.

"You destroyed _my_ home!" Mark butts in.

"You almost killed our son!" Mr and Mrs Turner yell together.

Dee points to Timmy's friend. "You're right, I did lead you astray, but only because I knew you would assault me and steal my treasure, and I wanted to avoid that at all costs."

She points to the fighter. "Turbo, I can only apologise for what I did to you. When I ran away, I put Wonder World back where it was, good as new. Sort of. And Yugopotamia is up and running again," she adds to Mark, "so I hope you can both forgive me."

She points to Timmy's parents. "As for your son, I was never trying to kill him. I love him. He's my special little light. Aren't you?" She directs her last question at the Chosen One himself, striding forwards, filling the gap in the circle.

Immediately there is a pigtailed figure blocking Timmy's view of the Darkness. "Get back!" Tootie snarls. "Haven't you done enough?"

Timmy tries to peer around her. _When did Tootie get involved in this?_

"What are you talking about?" Dee asks.

"What am I – ? LOOK AT HIM!" the stalker shrieks.

Something strange happens. Timmy is outside himself. He's looking down at his own emaciated frame cowering behind Tootie. He meets the thing's otherworldly gaze. Then, quick as a flash, he's back in his body where he should be, looking up at Dee, who is scrutinising him with pursed lips and a tilted head.

Did they just switch places? Is that how close they are?

What does it all mean?

"There's nothing wrong with Timmy," Dee finally says.

"Besides the dirt and the thinness and the _eyes_?" Tootie says, expressionless, dangerous.

"He only looks odd to you because he's not where he should be: inside my heart. He'll be fine once I take him back." She crouches, her arms stretching out to pick him up.

"Don't you dare!" Tootie smacks her cheek.

"OW!"

The yelp comes from Timmy.

The attention is back on the Chosen One. People swell over him like a wave on a beach. There are uncountable cries of "What's wrong?" and "Are you all right?"

"I'm fine, I'm fine," he insists. His cheek still smarts, but not as much now.

"What was that about?" A curious Cosmo tries flicking Dee's face. Timmy winces and whimpers. The fairy pushes her head to the left. The child's head whips to the side. The fairy holds her nose. The child gasps for air.

"I think that's enough," Wanda halts him.

"You're a sly fox, aren't you, _Dee_?" Jorgen growls. He addresses the others. "Don't you see what she's done? They're too closely linked. If we attack her, we'll attack Turner as well – and he'll be injured the most."

Timmy shivers. There's no way to defeat the Darkness without him dying as well. Others murmur in worried tones all around him, but he stays silent. He cannot put his feelings into words. He is both excited and relaxed. He is terrified for himself, but also relieved for Dee. It's weird. His pulse doesn't know whether to speed up or slow down.

"You see? All you do is hurt him. So stay away from Timmy," Tootie orders her foe. "He's home now. He doesn't want you anymore. Just leave him alone."

"How do you know that's what Timmy wants?" Dee sneers. "Why don't you try asking him first?"

"You know what? I will." The girl settles cross-legged before her crush, taking his hands in hers. "Timmy, what do you want? Do you want to be with us or the Darkness?"

Timmy meets her bespectacled eyes, bulging wide and almost pleading with him. He notices all the other faces staring back at him, jaws tense, silently urging him to choose them. Finally, he gawks over Tootie's head to find Dee. That being's face is not like the others. It is completely blank, as if she couldn't care what he chose as long as he was happy.

He has no idea what to say.

He's grateful for these people who were trying to save him. When he first leapt into the Darkness's mouth, he missed them so much. He missed Cosmo and Wanda and Poof, he missed his parents, he missed his friends – heck, part of him even missed Icky Vicky. But when he was in Dee for a little longer, something shifted. It was kind of nice to be surrounded by all that love, knowing it wasn't going anywhere, whereas everyone else was bound to forsake him eventually. And the sheer bliss that flooded his whole body was indescribable.

He loves his rescuers, but what if he loves the monster, too?

The boy closes his eyes, his horrible dead eyes. No-one told him being a hero was so difficult.

"Look…" He has to force the words through the cluster of nerves blocking his throat. "I just want everything to … go back to normal. But … I don't want to kill Dee to make that happen." He raises his head and spots her smiling, and he takes a deep breath. "Maybe we can work this out together."

"But the prophecy says you're supposed to 'end' the Darkness," Turbo insists.

Timmy shrugs. "Prophecies aren't always right."

"I'll say," Vicky agrees. "I mean, I don't remember the prophecy saying Dimmsdale was gonna be totally destroyed."

"Excuse me?"

The crowd parts for Timmy. His home town has been practically wiped out. Piles of bricks and slate sit where the buildings should be. Shards of glass sparkle in the streets between felled trees. The blue sky is gradually being obscured by dark-red clouds. The only object still standing is his house.

"What happened to Dimmsdale?!"

"It was Trixie's fault!" is Tootie's instant reply.

"Huh?"

"She let the Darkness absorb her wind powers and then it made a tornado!"

Timmy doesn't even bother trying to understand. "Cosmo, Wanda, I wish Dimmsdale was back to normal."

His godparents raise their wands – and nothing happens. Their wands droop. The damage remains exactly as it was.

Timmy folds his arms. "Now what?"

"You're part-Darkness," Wanda explains. "Fairies don't grant wishes to the Darkness."

"Eep." Her godson fiddles with his gaping sleeve. _Part-Darkness…_

"Allow me." Dee hacks and brings up Jorgen's massive wand, ignoring the disgusted cries around her. She passes it to the leader, whose nose crinkles as he brushes it off.

"Let there be Dimmsdale!" he bellows, slamming his wand on the ground.

With a series of POOFs, houses and flats and office buildings spring up from the ground. Trees and flowerbeds are replanted. The city is resurrected.

But things are not quite the same.

…

Turbo, Mark, Mandie and Dark Laser are free to go home, but they have instead been hanging out in the Timmy Cave.

Mr and Mrs Turner were told by their son that they could go back to work, but they both applied for a week's holiday to stay at home despite forgetting how to be parents a long time ago.

Chester, A.J., Trixie and Tootie are back at school, but they barely talk to their classmates, only to each other about when Timmy might be re-joining them.

Crocker is still teaching, writing "2 + 2 = FISH" on the blackboard and making the kids copy the nonsensical sum into their books, but he hasn't been dishing out as many Fs as he used to.

Jorgen is trying to concentrate on sorting out the newly-liberated Fairy World, but he keeps popping back to Turner's room to check up on him.

Cosmo, Wanda and Poof watch Timmy from their fishbowl, but he barely talks to them.

Everything in Dimmsdale is back to normal, except for a certain ragtag group of humans and fairies and aliens. They mention their concern as little as possible. If you don't talk about it, it's not happening – and even if it is, it'll go away sooner if you ignore it, right?

Right?

…

It's a sunny Saturday morning. Vicky parks her car outside the Turners' house and climbs out, with Tootie in tow clutching a paper bag of supplies. The sisters edge around the white chair where the Darkness – Dee – sits. Vicky unlocks the front door with her own key.

The creature leaps up and makes a break for the entrance. Vicky kicks her in the stomach. Dee is knocked back into the chair.

"AAAGH!"

An ear-splitting scream bursts from upstairs.

Too late, Vicky remembers the curse. "Sorry!" she calls. "Now look what you made me do!" she hisses to Dee.

"If you would just let me see him-"

"Never," Vicky cuts her off, slamming the door in her face.

The babysitter and her little twerpette scamper upstairs and swing open the door to Timmy's room. "Good morning, Timmy!" Tootie sings out.

Her greeting is returned with a bout of violent puking.

"What did you do this time?" a green-eyed goldfish asks the teenager.

"It was only a kick to keep her out. I didn't think…" Vicky trails off. She gingerly approaches the bed, where Timmy's head is buried in a giant red bucket. "You okay, kiddo?"

A couple of retches later, he resurfaces. "I think that's it." He hands her the bucket. She peeks at the bizarre bubbling vat of inky vomit and holds it at arm's length. She traipses off to pour it down the toilet; she'll be thankful to be rid of the acrid smell.

When she returns, he is sitting quietly in bed as if nothing happened. But the kid is still a wreck. He is a stick figure, a stranger to his own bedroom, too weak to get out of bed and so propped up on too many pillows. There are comics strewn about on the floor; Vicky had piled them up the day before, but when she'd finished he took one look at the tower and pushed it over. At the moment he just sits and stares at the wall, barely registering the presence of the girls or his fish. Only the tiniest sliver of light peeps through the heavy curtains in a vain attempt to banish the gloom.

"How are you feeling this morning?" Tootie squeezes his hand. "Better? Besides the puking, I mean."

"Not bad." His voice is just above a whisper.

"Here, I made you breakfast." Vicky opens a plastic pot and pours the contents onto a plate, rearranging the bacon and eggs into a smiley face.

Timmy watches her closely. "Who are you, and what have you done with Vicky?"

"Don't get too excited. Your parents are paying me extra to take care of you."

"There she is," the boy smirks.

It's kind of sad that he's happy to see her being greedy. It's as if he actually wants to be at the receiving end of her familiar wickedness, simply because it's a little piece of normality.

Vicky squishes a knife and fork into his tiny fists. "Come on, chow down!"

"I'm not hungry."

"You have to eat something! You're so thin I could play the xylophone on your ribcage." She lightly taps his chest. "But I'm not going to because that would be mean."

Timmy inspects the knife as if he's never seen cutlery before. Then he slowly saws through the bacon, picks up a miniscule amount of meat, and puts it in his mouth. With a great effort, he swallows.

"I'm full," he tells her.

"One more mouthful," Tootie insists. "That's all we ask. Can you do that for us?"

The bacon is already churning in his belly. "Make Vicky ask me in a nasty way."

"Why?"

"Please. Make her stop being nice. It's creepy."

Vicky blinks, then frowns. "Come on, is that the best you can do?" she growls. "Some Chosen One you are."

It's like flicking a switch. He's ploughing through the rashers, only stopping once to glance up at the woman he used to fear. The sisters share a hopeful glance. Vicky's strategy of 'tough love' is working. Until –

Timmy blanches. He knocks the plate off the bed. It smashes on the floor. His fingers strain for the bucket. Tootie shoves it under his mouth. Another spiel of sick erupts. She cringes at the sight. When he gives it back to her, undigested bacon floats in the mix.

"Sorry," he mumbles, fidgeting with the collar of his pyjamas.

"Don't worry about it!" Vicky shrugs it off. "It was worth a shot, right?"

The babysitter takes the bucket and leaves again, repeating a now-familiar routine: have a picnic, puke it up and pour it all away.

She sighs as the liquid swirls down the drain. Years ago, Vicky wasn't sure she even had a heart, let along heartstrings that others could tug. But that's what Timmy's doing to her right now.

She hates seeing him like this. She hates it when she keeps accidentally hurting him. She hates it when he can barely keep any foodstuff down, not even his beloved chocolate chip cookies. She hates to see that his vomit is always the colour of midnight.

It could take months, even years, before the Darkness's poison is purged from his body.

It can't happen soon enough.

…

Vicky and Tootie stay with Timmy for the rest of the day. They flit between _Crimson Chin_ comics, episodes of _Crash Nebula_ and virtual battles on _Decimator_ (with the sisters letting Timmy win every time). Vicky doesn't make him do chores in his fragile state. She doesn't taunt him with some chainsaw she bought off the Internet. She's become the babysitter he always wished for but never got. As for Tootie, not once does Timmy hear the usual silly pet names and high-pitched squeals coming from her mouth. Now is not the time to be romantic.

Though the curtains are closed, Timmy knows when the evening comes because the band of light streaming through the gap changes colour, lemon yellow merging into bright orange. The TV is switched off. There's a distinct lack of activity.

"Was Dee there this morning?" Timmy blurts out, breaking the silence.

"Yep. Still barricading the house," Vicky adds, curling her lip.

He knew without asking. Sometimes he closes his eyes and sees everything the Darkness sees: the locked door, the slightly unkempt front lawn, the curtained windows. He feels what she feels, too – a desperate longing, an emptiness inside that no sweet treat can ever fill.

"Why?" That's all he can say.

"Why what?"

"Why are so many people fighting over me?" He plays with the quilt, lifting it up and letting it fall again. "I'm not that special."

"Don't say that!" Tootie suddenly leaps onto the bed, kneeling before her friend. "You're the Chosen One! You're the most special person in the universe!"

"Yeah, but … I feel so awkward. Like I'm getting in the way of everyone." He deliberates, running a hand through his hair. "I have an idea to stop Dee bothering you all. And to stop me bothering you all."

Vicky rolls her eyes. "Let me guess: you sacrifice yourself to the Darkness _again_ , but this time, we carry on living our lives without you."

There's a pregnant pause.

"Well, what do you know? Great minds think alike!" Timmy tries a cheesy grin.

"You're unbelievable!" Tootie seizes his bony shoulders, forcing herself to face those dark orbs. "Timmy, do you know what we went through to get you _out_ of the Darkness? We've been searching a Blue Moon, hiding in a bunker with angry aliens, freeing the fairies from their prison and having epic battles with merciless robots! Do you think we did all that just so you could hop into the Darkness again and leave us behind? Do you?"

Timmy says nothing.

" _DO YOU?_ " she screeches into his face.

"I don't know!" he cries, shrinking away.

"Of course not!" Tootie lets go. "No-one wants to lose you." She sinks back onto her feet. "So you're not going anywhere, mister."

Timmy bows his head. "Yes, ma'am." His voice is thick. "I just want it to end."

"And it will!" Vicky reassures him. "Relax, sit tight, and it'll all work out. We'll fix this. Trust me."

…

"Oh, we're never going to fix this!"

Vicky paces the length of the living room, Tootie copying her almost exactly. Timmy's fairy family perches on the edge of the couch, while Timmy's human parents stand to the side.

"He's not getting any better," Tootie frets. "He almost seemed worse today." She nibbles her nails. "What if he's too far gone? What if he's…?" She can't finish her sentence.

"This is ridiculous," Mr Turner snaps. "We can't keep walking on eggshells … it's really painful!" He scrapes the shards from his bare feet.

"I agree with my husband," Mrs Turner pipes up. "On a metaphorical level, I mean. We need to try something different, be more direct. Who has any ideas?"

There's a collective "Aww!"

"What kind of idea was that?" Timmy's mother puts her hand on her hips.

"Sorry, Poof was smiling to himself and it was really cute," Cosmo explains.

Vicky pinches the urchin's cheek. "Even my cold dark heart can't resist the joy of a baby's smile." It dawns on her. "That's it! We need Timmy to see Poof! We need to remind him what's good about life!"

"Of course!" Wanda beams. "A child's innocence is the most powerful thing in the universe."

"Well, what are waiting for? Let's do this!" Mr Turner declares.

Poof giggles, and the others practically melt in the face of his adorableness.

This baby is their new hope.

This baby is their last chance.


	12. Chapter Twelve: The Second Sacrifice

**Author's Note: Thanks for the reviews, queenmancilla13 and bbst! Not much more to go now! I hope you've all enjoyed this story so far. Please keep reading and reviewing!**

Chapter Twelve: The Second Sacrifice

Timmy emerges from his slumber the next morning to find a purple ball bouncing on the bed.

"Poof, poof!"

The baby bumps to the floor. Timmy hoists himself up, curious. The small fairy ricochets from wall to wall, giggling and shaking his rattle all the while. With each rebound, something changes about the room. Wilting flowers in a vase start to bloom again; the smell assaults Timmy's nostrils. The curtains spring apart and let in the light; the boy covers his face and hisses like a cat.

Poof finally settles in Timmy's lap. He's beaming at his big brother with shiny peepers and red cheeks and a cuteness Timmy has never witnessed to such an extent before.

It's a look that seems to gaze beyond the Chosen One's distorted black eyes to the average kid beneath.

It's a look that seems to beg, _Please love me!_

…

Cosmo and Wanda press their faces against the glass of the fishbowl. They wait to see what their godson's reaction will be.

…

Nothing. No joy. No sadness. No pleasure. No pain. Nothing. Absolutely nothing at all.

Timmy picks up his godbrother. Those violet eyes swallow him up, waiting for him to reciprocate all that happiness, all that love. But he cannot. There's some kind of barrier in his head that won't let any feelings come to the fore.

Is he really so numb?

He chucks Poof at the wall.

The baby recoils and lands back where he started, in Timmy's hands. The grin has vanished, but the love is still in those confused eyes. And Timmy has no idea why.

He's not numb after all. He can still feel guilt. The proof is in the way it gnaws at his tummy. "Are you okay?" he asks.

There's no movement from Poof at first. And why should there be? He wouldn't understand the question. But then the beaming face returns.

"Don't smile at me!" Timmy barks. "I just threw you across the room! Stop being happy!"

The imp ignores him. That grin … it sickens him. Why does he feel his way?

"Please, stop – I – I can't – oh, what's wrong with me?"

Timmy bursts into tears. He presses Poof to his chest. The little one whinges. He's holding on too tightly. His body is uncomfortably icy. _I'm sorry, Poof._ But he can't let go.

Everything's been spoiled. Nothing moves him, not in the way it used to. He can't enjoy the things he once did. He can't relate to his so-called loved ones anymore. Because – because they're lacking something. Because they're inferior to the state he reached inside the Darkness.

Not even Poof's pure joy comes close to the haven that Dee conjured for him.

His teardrops are black, like mascara running when a mean girl cries in a high school movie. They stream down his face and plop into Poof's thin lilac hair. The baby wails along with Timmy; outside, the sky turns grey and rain starts to fall.

Cosmo and Wanda ping into their fairy forms. "Is everything okay?" the lady asks.

The flow of tears is briefly stemmed. For the first time since his retrieval, Timmy smiles at his fairy godmother. "Yes, Wanda. Everything's fine."

An eyebrow rises. "But … you're crying."

"I know." He lets her hold the now-quieter baby, turns his back on them all and snuggles down. "Good night."

"It's morning," Cosmo reminds him.

"I'm still tired," says Timmy.

His fairies don't argue with him.

He closes his eyes but doesn't dream. The beginnings of a plan come together in his mind.

He knows what's wrong with him now.

He knows what he has to do to make things right.

…

Timmy can't remember when he last walked; he can't fully remember a time when he wasn't floating through the Darkness or lying in bed. It's a little nauseating. The world wants to rush past, even when he moves as slowly as he can. Splodges of colour frequently obscure his vision.

But he can't stop now.

 _Tiptoe, tiptoe, tiptoe…_ He repeats it to himself, a magic mantra driving the movement of his feet through the sleeping house long after he thinks of giving up. He clings to the banister as he shuffles downstairs. He fumbles with the key and then practically yanks the door open.

Dee leaps to her feet as soon as she sees him, tipping the chair over. "Timmy!" she squeals.

"SSH!"

"Sorry, sorry." She lowers her voice. "I thought I'd never see you again!"

The boy hugs her legs. "I need you, Dee. A baby smiled and it did nothing for me. You've ruined me. You've ruined the life I used to have. It's dull compared to you. I can't enjoy it."

"What are you saying?"

He lifts his head. "I'm saying I want you to take me back. I want to be happy again. And only you can make that happen."

Without warning, Dee scoops him up and spins him around, crimson irises blazing. "Oh, Timmy Turner, you will not regret this!" she babbles. Her mouth gapes open and twists into a portal, black and dotted with stars. She tosses her little light inside.

He's whizzing through the tunnel, through the debris, through an endless stretch of nothingness, too quickly to make out the details. Dee's heart comes into view, pale grey standing out amidst all the blackness. The hole he had to squeeze through the first time he came here is now bigger than ever.

This is it.

His buddies, his mortal enemies, his family, his fairy godparents … he'd forgotten about them before, and now he's going to forget them all over again. He's sacrificing his yesterdays with them for the eternal tomorrow with Dee. _I'm doing the right thing,_ he tells himself. _They'll be fine without me._

But will _he_ be fine without them?

The question hits him like a rock to the head. He's advancing towards Dee's heart, and he wishes he wasn't.

The past ten years have been pretty eventful. He's made friends and made enemies, loved girls and lost girls, rescued a goat and saved Fairy World from disaster. As you do. Compared to all that, eternal bliss seems pretty boring.

Besides, Dee is just that – Dee. She's only one person, and that's not enough to get by. There's more variety among the people surrounding Timmy in Dimmsdale. Trixie is pretty but distant, Tootie is loving but clingy, and Vicky is confident but malicious. Mark is a gross teenage boy, and Jorgen is a Schwarzenegger clone. Wanda is the smart one, and Cosmo is … uh … well, she thinks he's cute, right?

He can make jokes like that because he's known them for years. He's known the Darkness for little more than a week. There's really no comparison. You don't just turn your back on your old life without a second glance, without a pang of sadness. That's if you can bring yourself to turn away at all.

They'll miss him if he goes through with this.

He'll miss them if he goes through with this.

 _What am I doing to them all? To myself?_

"I can't do it!" he cries suddenly.

"Timmy?" Dee takes his hand with a feathery appendage. "You haven't changed your mind, have you?"

"I-I-I-" he stutters. Fear robs him of the ability to speak. The Darkness feels to him like four walls, incarcerating him, threatening to close in on him even more and crush him if he makes a break for it.

"Don't be scared," she whispers, sweet as honey, taking his other hand. "It's only natural to have second thoughts. Come to me. I'll make it all better. I'll make you happy."

Timmy yanks himself free of her clutches as if he's been stung. "I won't go through with this," he asserts.

"Yes, you will." Dee's voice is cold and hard.

"I won't. I'm not leaving everything behind because some monster tells me to. Just because you're big and scary doesn't mean-"

Dee closes around his neck. "Take that back! I am not a monster!"

Timmy claws at his throat. "Let go … you're … hurting me!" he chokes.

"Am I?" She instantly releases him.

He flails for the exit. Dee clamps down on him, dragging him back by the legs. He pushes her away; she returns, her hold stronger than ever, a more powerful and terrifying version of Tootie. "Get back here!" she orders.

"LEAVE ME ALONE!"

He blasts her with a ray of light.

They are both equally wounded. The agony fizzles at his skin like a Mento in a cola bottle. He's flung into the distance.

He lands with a THUD.

The world is still.

Once the shock of the fall has left his body, Timmy opens his eyes. He's outside the Darkness. He's on the front lawn, cool grass against his cheek. It's still night-time, but the outlines of houses are visible in the twilight.

The child crawls to his hands and knees. He spots Dee – and, through the heart-shaped hole in her chest, he spots a tree.

"Timmy, do you see this?" She puts her fingers through the gap in her body and wriggles them about. He doesn't answer. "I need you here," Dee continues. "I need you to complete me." She takes a deep breath. "I JUST WANT A FRIEND WHO ISN'T A ROBOT!" she screams to the heavens.

Timmy stands. "If you want to be my friend, you have to be friendly. You have to let me go."

She grits her teeth. "Impossible. How can I trust you not to become my enemy?" She advances with her hands on her hips. "How can I trust you to love me forever unless you're far away from those poisonous influences?"

"You mean my friends and family?" The object of the Darkness's affections backs away. "Dee, this isn't you. When we met, you were a nice girl looking for love, and you were caring and sweet and you'd do anything for me. I want that Dee to come back. Don't turn into the bad guy they think you are."

She's taken aback by this. Her face freezes into an open-mouthed expression of surprise. Her arms flop to her sides. For too long, she stands absolutely motionless. Timmy waits, blinking a bead of sweat out of his eye. A vein on Dee's forehead twitches. "Come back to me," she presses him, "and we have a deal. Let me take you, and I'll stay away from the people you care about."

Timmy gulps. The hair prickles on the back of his neck. His palms are clammy. "I can't," he says quietly.

"Excuse me?"

His heartbeat is as fast as the thrumming wings of a caged bird. "I can't," he repeats.

"Very well." Dee nods. "Time for Plan B."

She bends, picks up a stone and throws it at one of the Turners' first-floor windows. "Hey, Cosmo, Wanda!" she yells. "You might want to come down here!"

"What are you doing?"

She pounces on the Chosen One, locking him into a rib-breaking hug. "They've put a spell on you," she spits into his ear. "You'll always love them more than you can love me. But if they're gone…" She flashes him a toothy grin. "…you'll have nowhere else to turn!"

Timmy's pupils shrink in horror. "NO!" he screams.

She blocks his mouth with her hand. "Stop resisting. You won't even know they're dead," she snarls. "Once you're in my blissful stupor, it will be as if they never existed."

He writhes in her embrace. He squirms, desperate to loosen the grip. It's no use. She's too strong. He's too weak.

POOF!

His fairy family assembles on the lawn. "Timmy!" Wanda screeches. Concern turns to anger. "You awful, awful woman! Give him back!"

"If you want him, you'll have to come and get him!" Dee taunts.

Timmy wants to shout, "No! Don't! It's a trap!" But all he can manage is a muffled wail.

His godparents point their glowing yellow wands at the abomination.

A gust of wind snatches them away.

They swoop into Dee's eager hand.

"D'oh!" says Cosmo. Without those staffs, they're powerless.

Dee taps her chin with the end of the sticks. "Hmm. What do Da Rules say about wishing people were dead?"

"You can't do that," Wanda snaps.

A purple book appears in Dee's face. "It says here a godchild is not allowed to wish to kill another human being." When Da Rules vanish, she is frowning and smiling at the same time. "There's nothing there about killing _fairies_."

The godparents' faces are pale. Timmy attempts to kick the wands out of Dee's grasp, but she holds them just out of reach.

He's welling up again. If people thought the Darkness was evil before, that's nothing compared to what she's trying now. She's going to murder his loved ones until there's nobody left. She's going to wipe out the Fairywinkle-Cosmas. The ones who paid more attention to Timmy than anyone else. The ones who taught him everything he knows about life. The ones who bravely fought to get him out of trouble even if the trouble was all his fault in the first place. She's going to rob the world of the coolest fairy family ever.

The Chosen One clenches his fists. The chill of the fear has faded. In its place is a burning rage.

Cosmo and Wanda and Poof must not die because of him.

"I wish you three fairies were-"

With a blast of white, Timmy shoots out of the Darkness's grasp. He hits the ground face-first, but leaps to his feet almost instantly. By contrast, Dee is pinching her nose and wheezing. She clings on to the wands, ready to try again. "I wish-"

She's assaulted by another glare. She yelps, staggers backwards and covers her eyes. Her arms are littered with scratches. "I wish-"

A third beacon sears her papery skin, scraps of which peel away to reveal her true inky form beneath. She screams and madly claws at the hole in her chest, ripping it even wider open. She is truly a beast now, eyes bulging, teeth bared, shoulders heaving, gashes weeping with shadows instead of blood, fingers tainted by her own murky flesh.

"Timmy Turner," she growls, swaying a little, "you wouldn't end the Darkness, would you? What happened to 'don't turn into the bad guy'?"

"I could ask you the same question," he responds, no emotion in his voice whatsoever.

His eyes glow a brilliant white.

The little light becomes a big one.

The world is illuminated.

And then it disappears entirely.

…

"Timmy? Can you hear me?"

The boy blinks a little more and wraps his fingers around a smooth hand. A green-haired fairy looks down on his godson, who is lying on a pedestal. The clouds in the sky above are pastel pink.

"Where are we?" Timmy sits up.

"He's awake!"

"He's alive!"

"Hey, Chosen One! Over here!"

To his left is a restless crowd of winged supporters chanting his name. To his right is the Fairy Council building, a coral-coloured structure four columns wide.

A bulky shadow falls on Cosmo and the child. "Turner. You're conscious. Just in time for the official announcement."

"What official announcement?"

Jorgen approaches a microphone and taps it. "One, two, three…" It squeaks a little in protest. The fairies wince at the noise. Eventually there is silence.

"Ladies and gentleman," the leader begins, "it is my pleasure to reveal that after over ten thousand years in fear of our lives, we need worry no more. Thanks to Timmy Turner … THE DARKNESS IS GONE FOR GOOD!" He finishes his short speech with a booming roar.

Cheers erupt across Fairy World. Balloons tumble to the ground. Streamers shoot from rooftop cannons. Fireworks blaze across the sky.

Dumbstruck, Timmy watches with puzzled blue eyes.


	13. Chapter Thirteen: Timmy's Triumph

**Author's Note: This looks like the last chapter, besides the epilogue I'm working on. :( Thanks to everyone who has followed, favourited and reviewed this story. I really appreciate your support!**

Chapter Thirteen: Timmy's Triumph

The regular routine will soon be resumed.

Right after the celebration.

The cream-coloured hall is packed with people, mostly fairies, with some human beings and a few Yugopotamians, Boudacians and Wonder World inhabitants as well. Round tables with white cloths are clustered at one end, the rest of the room becoming a dancefloor. The walls are lined with pink balloons; someone has drawn buck-toothed faces on each of them with a black marker pen. The evening began with a performance of KISS's greatest hits, and now the massive speaker system onstage plays Chip Skylark's _My Shiny Teeth and Me_. Crocker and Timmy's parents are moving the most energetically – until they break their backs.

"GAH!" The teacher hobbles to the edge of the dancefloor to recover. The man of the hour is standing nearby, holding a glass of water, stony-faced. "Cheer up, boy, it may never happen!" Crocker tells him, chuckling a little at his own joke.

"It already has," Timmy corrects him. His eyes are back to normal, his body temperature is no longer frighteningly low, and he's regained the weight he'd lost. Despite the healing, he can't bring himself to pretend he's having a good time.

"What's the matter, eh? How can you not be enjoying this party?" Crocker prods, still rubbing his sore back. "The Darkness has been vanquished, you're a hero, and you're surrounded by FAIRIES! Did you know they have different types of magical creatures? I DIDN'T!" he yells in Timmy's face. "I'm still trying to find them all. It's like Bingo, but better, because it has FAIRIES!" He stops twitching and composes himself. "What's up?"

"You wouldn't understand."

"Try me."

Timmy swigs from his glass and sighs. "I guess I can't believe Dee's gone. Or that I was the one who – got rid of her."

Crocker raises his hand, then lowers it. "Were it not for the school's no-touch policy, I'd give you a reassuring pat on the back."

"It's the thought that counts," Timmy shrugs. "Anyway, this may sound weird, but for a while I kind of liked Dee. Sure, she was creepy and possessive, but she had a good side. And I keep thinking maybe if we tried harder, she'd still be here and she wouldn't be so evil, or…" He catches Vicky across the room, at a table with the other kids, recounting her view of the epic showdown to a rapt group of Yugopotamians, complete with exaggerated hand gestures. "Maybe she wouldn't be so hated," he finishes. He swallows, forcing down a ball of remorse and phlegm.

"Don't blame yourself," says Crocker. "Desperate times call for desperate measures. Your … FAIRY GODPARENTS! … come first, don't they?"

"Of course." Timmy finds them laughing along to Vicky's tale. "They're my best friends. They make me feel safe and special."

"Well, then, you did what you had to do." Crocker straightens up; his back pain must be subsiding. "Besides, I don't believe it's possible to do the right thing."

The boy turns back to his teacher. "No?"

"The most we can hope to achieve is the least wrong thing."

With this opinion, he leaves Timmy be.

A few seconds later, the music quietens and Jorgen poofs onstage. "Is everyone having a good time?" he asks the audience.

Hoots pierce the air.

"SILENCE!" he bellows.

The cheering ceases.

"Let's not forget why we're here," the khaki-clad warrior lectures them. "Let's have a few words from the Chosen One!"

The whoops recommence. Timmy groans inwardly as he edges through the crowd and trudges up the steps. He stands before the microphone, which lowers to his height all by itself. "Hello," he says into it.

"Hi!" Cupid waves from afar.

"Uh…" Timmy begins. The whole room is waiting to hear his big speech. The pressure to perform ripples all around him. "Uh…" he repeats. Most listeners still have sympathetic smiles on their faces, but how long can that last? _Come on, you twerp, say something!_

"The Darkness is no more," he blurts out. "I – I stopped it." There are scattered claps at the news they must already know.

Timmy nibbles his lip. He scans the crowd, searching for _them_. He needs them. He catches them at the back of the room, the familiar shades of green, pink and purple. They remind him that the nightmares he used to have were all lies, that he hasn't been forsaken, that it's all over and he's safe now.

He pulls the microphone free of its stand. "I'm gonna be honest: I don't feel like I really saved anyone. You were the ones who saved me – who saved us all." He paces the stage. "I'm talking about Cosmo and Wanda and Poof, and Mom and Dad, and Jorgen, and Turbo Thunder, and Chester and A.J. and Trixie and Tootie, and Mark and Mandie, and Vicky and Crocker and Dark Laser." He pauses to take a breath. "I wasn't the only one who defeated Dee – I mean, the Darkness. I had you guys pushing me forward. I had your support, your friendship, your … your love. I sure I don't deserve it," he goes on, to which a female voice boos in disagreement, "but I can't thank you enough for it. Because without that behind me, I'd never have had the courage to take her down."

There's an intolerable silence as he returns the microphone to the stand. Cosmo and Wanda are the first to clap, followed by Tootie and Trixie and Chester and A.J., then his parents, then Vicky and Mark, and then there's too much noise coming from too many angles to properly register its source. It's not long until the hall has fully erupted into rapturous applause.

Timmy scurries offstage, dodges the congratulatory people and is reunited with his fairy family. "How did I do?"

"That was brilliant!" Wanda reassures him. "Except for one part."

"Which part?"

"The moment when you said you didn't deserve all that love." She takes his shoulders and looks him in the eyes. "You _do_ , sport. You deserve every bit of it, because you're smart and witty and caring and brave and – and I don't know what else I have to say to convince you."

She hugs him. It's brief, but it's enough.

It's enough to persuade him she's telling the truth.

…

These fairies have some delicious food. Everybody chows down while the dancefloor is empty and the music has slowed to a series of quiet orchestral pieces. Timmy scrapes out the last dredges of chocolate chip ice cream and slides his chair away from the table, sitting back, clutching his stomach, completely full. Tootie copies him almost exactly. "How come their ice cream is so much better than ours?" she gurgles.

"Magic," is Timmy's reply.

"Makes sense." She licks her mint-stained lips.

"Hey, Tootie?"

"Mm-hmm?"

He folds up his napkin. "Thanks for pulling me out of the Darkness."

Tootie rolls her eyes. "I told you, it was nothing! You don't have to keep thanking me every five seconds!"

"Then maybe I should apologise."

The girl blinks. "For what?"

"I'm sorry I was so rude to you. You know, when you came up to me and said I was your Prince Charming and stuff." He plays with his spoon. "I should have been nicer. I could have let you down a lot more gently."

Tootie rests a hand on his shoulder. "I don't blame you for snapping. I was kind of annoying."

"Listen…" Timmy puts the spoon down. "When we're back on Earth, would you like to go out with me sometime?"

She takes her hand back. "You mean, like a date?"

"Sort of." He's not looking at her, though. He's looking at Trixie, who's sitting across the table biting into the cherry on top of her sundae.

Tootie sighs. "You're not fooling me, Timmy." He regards her as she continues. "Look, this whole adventure has taught me one thing: You can't keep one person to yourself. You have to back off and let them live their own lives." She nods towards the popular kid. "If you want to go on a date with Trixie, go on a date with Trixie. If you think there's a chance you guys would work out, you should take it and see what happens. And if it _doesn't_ work out, you know where I am," she adds with a cheeky grin.

Timmy dares to grin in return. "Are you sure about this?"

"Absolutely." She pushes Timmy to his feet.

He circles the table and slowly approaches his crush. "Hey, Trixie."

"Timmy!" Her whole pretty face lights up. Her joy certainly seems genuine. But he needs to know for sure.

He takes his hat off and fiddles with it. "Listen, um, I was wondering if you-"

"Yes."

"You didn't let me finish."

"You were about to ask me out, weren't you?"

"No, I was gonna ask for a hundred bucks." He puts his hat back on his head. "And you've already said yes, so you'd better pay up." He holds his hand out.

"Nice try," Trixie sniggers. They share a little laugh. "I hear the ice rink is good this year," she resumes, winking. "We could check it out together."

In his head, Timmy is leaping into the air and screaming at the top of his lungs. In real life, all he can say is, "Great!"

She plonks him on her lap. "Let's kiss again."

Timmy's cheeks redden. "What? Right now? In public?"

Trixie twirls a strand of hair around her finger. "You're not a chicken, are you?"

"Nope!" To prove it, he moves in to peck her cheek. But she turns her head at the last second. Their lips lock. When he tries pulling away, she comes with him. He stops fighting it and lingers a little longer in the cherry-scented goodness.

They finally part. "Kisses are so much better when you're not in mortal danger," says Timmy.

"I agree." They gaze into each other's eyes. The rest of the party fades into insignificance.

Tootie has to turn away. She now faces Chester and A.J., who are just as bewildered by the romantic developments as her. "Who wants a stalker on the rebound?"

"Not me!" Chester yelps, ducking behind his friend.

"I'm cool, thanks," A.J. replies.

Timmy and Trixie are jolted out of their stupor by a man bleating, "Turner!"

"Jorgen!" Timmy hops off his new girlfriend's lap.

"You do realise after this party I'm erasing everyone's memories and you'll go back to being the Not-Chosen Buck-Toothed Loser Boy?"

"NO!" the kids cry.

"It's not ideal," Jorgen admits, "but I can't have so many puny humans knowing about the existence of fairies. We can't risk the secret getting out to even more people."

Trixie sniffs. "But Timmy and I haven't even had our first date yet!"

"Yeah!" Timmy joins in, eyes flaming with indignation. "You can't erase our memories because – because you can't erase true love!"

There's a flicker of panic on Jorgen's face, but he conceals it with a scoff. "Where does it say _that_ in Da Rules?"

"Right here." Cosmo conjures the volume and shows him a page near the front.

The group pauses, awaiting his reaction.

"DAGNABBIT!"

The cry of irritation stuns the entire hall into silence.

What will they do now?

…

"This is Chet Ubetcha reporting live from the scene of a horrific meteor strike. At least nine individuals are presumed dead, six of them under eighteen. Although no bodies have been discovered in this smouldering crater behind me, there is evidence to suggest that there could not have been any survivors. The families have been informed."

…

Fairy World's newest members – Timmy, his parents, Crocker, Vicky, Tootie, Trixie, Chester and A.J. – float a few inches above the ground with their newly-earned wings. They watch the diminutive newsreader on a giant screen. In the background, Vicky and Tootie's parents, Chester's father, A.J.'s parents, Trixie's father and Crocker's mother can be glimpsed with bowed heads.

"Is this supposed to be comforting?" A.J. questions, crossing his arms. "I thought being a fairy would be awesome, but not if our parents are crying because they think we're dead!"

"I wish there was some way of letting them know we were okay," Timmy ponders.

The air sparkles. His arm automatically raises his wand. He'd forgotten he can grant his own wishes now.

POOF!

Onscreen, Chet glances down to find something white in his hand. "I've just been handed this piece of paper reading…" He squints at the messily-scribbled words. "'Don't worry, folks, it's not all bad on the Other Side.' A sign from beyond the grave? This reporter's curiosity is piqued."

"Give me that!" Bucky McBadbat snatches the document. "Hey, it also says, 'No-one sucks at baseball here.' And that bit's in Chester's handwriting!"

Mr Tang peers over. "Trixie says, 'They have way more flavours of lipgloss here than on Earth!'"

Dolores-Day Crocker takes the paper and sees for herself. "Denzel's got a house of his own! It's about time, too!"

The message is spread from parent to parent, drying their tears with every sentence read aloud, patching up part of their grief every time they spot a snippet of their child's optimistic words.

The kids in Fairy World hold each other's hands and share some slightly watery smiles. They've left a lot of sad people behind. But perhaps it's for the best. Perhaps it's what Crocker meant by the "least wrong thing" to do. Now they've made a clean break from their old lives, this new beginning has the potential to be incredible.


	14. Epilogue: What Happened Next

**Author's Note: This is it – the epilogue of "This Little Light of Mine". Thank you again for reading and reviewing – it's lovely to see people enjoying what I write. If you haven't already, feel free to check out my other fanfics!**

 **If you're interested, the inspiration for Timmy's family unit came from Garabatoz on DeviantArt. Check out "Vicky's Family," "Timmy Kids" and "Sis X Sis" and you'll see what I mean. ;)**

Epilogue: What Happened Next

It's amazing what a difference thirty years can make.

Turbo Thunder is now the leader of Wonder World. Under his presidency, the realm is being restored to its former glory, with piles of money having been poured into community regeneration schemes. He's also made a number of successful alliances with other planets, including Earth, sharing technology promising to advance education, healthcare and government efficiency. The Darkness's consumption of Wonder World is rarely brought up in polite conversation, but it was good for one thing: an outpouring of brilliant novels and inventive artwork inspired by the experience.

Mark and Mandie's engagement was the one topic that the Yugopotamians and Boudacians couldn't stop talking about. Mark's fellow-creatures couldn't understand what he saw in such a "hideous" woman, but they piped down once the potential political advantages of marrying a powerful warrior race were exposed. The wedding was thereafter highly attended. There haven't been any full-on wars with other planets yet, but the Boudacians are not above sending out the fighter pods to get what they want, much to Mark's chagrin. This power couple is pretty fearsome, and so are their two hundred children.

Chester and Tootie are husband and wife. Chester always thought girls gave him hives, but spending more time with Tootie as a teenager convinced him otherwise. By daring to look beyond her slightly dorky appearance, he saw all her good qualities – her optimism, her courage, her dedication, her self-sacrificial nature. He started making more of an effort to be nice to her, poofing up flowers and chocolates and the like. It took Tootie a while to realise what was going on; she was so used to pining after a single guy that she'd almost forgotten it was possible for _other_ guys to fall in love with her. In reality, there were plenty of fish in the sea. And one fish in particular was such a sweetie pie! They now have three daughters in total: sixteen-year-old Garnet (the Blonde Beauty), thirteen-year-old Beryl (the Bespectacled Brains) and eight-year-old Sapphire (the Bratty Brawn).

A.J. and Trixie are husband and wife. It didn't work out between her and Timmy; once the initial attraction had faded, they realised how little they had in common. Yes, they both had a fondness for _Crimson Chin_ comics, but Timmy grew out of them as a teenager, whereas Trixie refused to let go. Yes, they both avidly viewed _The Kissy Kissy Goo Goo Romance Hour_ , but disagreed over the extent of Rodrick's Flanderisation. The real nail in the coffin was Trixie's wandering gaze. She seemed to get the hang of magic faster than Timmy, so at school she was moved up to A.J.'s set, and they joined forces for many a Show-and-Tell project. Realising she might like A.J. more than Timmy, she umm-ed and ah-ed before breaking it off with her pink-hatted boyfriend. Words were exchanged (or rather shouted), and when the heat died down, she and A.J. were free to be together. They've stayed strong ever since. Their ten-year-old triplet sons are Matthew, Butch and Seth, each more mischievous than the last, each with a wackier hairstyle than the last.

Timmy and Vicky are husband and wife. No, they didn't expect it either. But after Timmy was unceremoniously dumped by Trixie, Vicky was actually the first one to comfort him, offering him a hug and a reassurance that he could do so much better. Emotions were kindled that evening, and gradually they became too powerful to be ignored. They tried dating other fairies, but it never worked out – perhaps because, deep down, they knew who their soulmate really was. One day, Timmy and Vicky sat down together and uncovered all the reasons why a relationship between them seemed less ridiculous than they first thought: They'd known each other for years; they spent more time with each other than anyone else; they balanced each other out by being so different from each other; they cared about each other more than they'd been previously willing to admit. Afterwards, they shared their first passionate kiss. When they revealed the relationship, their friends and relatives were pretty shocked, no-one more so than Tootie, but they fought with all their might until the others accepted their love. Their family now consists of fourteen-year-old Valentina and the ten-year-old twins called Tammy and Tommy.

It's amazing what a difference thirty years can make.

…

Crocker stands before a class of fairies, anti-fairies, leprechauns, elves and sprites. "To remember the three types of magic, from least to most difficult, we have this abbreviation: TMM." He chalks it on the blackboard. "Now, who can tell me what TMM stands for?"

A girl with long brown hair and diva glasses sticks her hand up. "Transportation, Mutation, Manifestation!" she parrots.

"Correct, Tammy. And what's-?"

"Transportation is the movement of an object from one place to another by magical means! Mutation is the transformation of one object into another! Manifestation is the conjuring of an object out of thin air!"

Tammy's brother Tommy, a black-haired boy with a pink Whoopie Hat, elbows her in the chest. "Why don't you give someone else a chance?" he barks at her.

"Turner, stop hitting Turner," Crocker scolds the boy. "Besides, if you're so smart, why don't you come up here and demonstrate the principles of TMM for yourself?"

"Fine." Tommy strides to the front of the classroom and picks up the apple on Crocker's desk. "This is transporting the apple," he begins. By pointing his wand at the fruit, it moves of its own accord – and flies into Tammy's head. She cries out in pain. A lump sprouts on her forehead.

"Turner…" Crocker warns.

"This is mutating the apple," Tommy continues. The fruit sprouts eight legs and scuttles across Tammy's desk.

"SPIDER!" she shrieks. She leaps up and dashes to the other end of the room. "Get it away from me, get it away from me!"

"Relax, sis, it's gone."

"Good." Tammy gingerly returns to her seat.

"And now I'm gonna make it manifest again!" Tommy adds with a malicious chuckle.

The tension returns. "Where is it? Has anyone seen it?" She flicks her head from side to side.

She spies it creeping over her shoulder.

Her scream shatters the glass in the windows.

The spider vanishes again. Tammy stands staring at her bare shoulder with a pale visage, while Tommy rolls on the floor laughing. "You should have seen your face!"

"TURNER!" The boy is silenced by Crocker's explosion. "Report to the Principal's office immediately!"

Tommy scowls and heads for the door. Tammy starts to follow him. "Not you," Crocker stops her.

"Who, me?" Tommy asks hopefully.

"No, the _other_ Turner." Crocker sighs. "Why are there so many Turners in one class?"

"There are two," Tammy points out as Tommy leaves.

"That's still two too many."

…

"He did WHAT?" The buck-toothed teenage redhead throws her head back and cackles. "And that got him sent to the Principal's office? You're such a wuss!"

Tammy folds her arms. "I was expecting a little more sympathy."

From the comfy armchair, Valentina regards her little sister, still sniggering a little. "Have you even _met_ me?"

"I guess not," Tammy grumbles. She hovers by the window. "Wait till Mom and Dad get home. They'll be concerned for me."

"Not Mom," Tommy corrects her. "She'll call you a wuss, too."

"Fine, Dad will be concerned." She cleans her glasses on her white t-shirt. When she puts them back on, there's a flash of pink and green past the window. "They're back!"

Valentina looks up from her magazine. "Already?"

Timmy has only just stepped inside when Tammy flies into her father's arms. The startled man peels her off. "Where's the fire?"

Tammy starts to whine, "Tommy hit-"

"Okay, before that, we have bigger news," Vicky cuts her off.

"How big?"

"We had a meeting at Fort Jorgen earlier," Timmy explains, "and he said we were making good progress with our course. If things keep going our way…" He trails off. "You tell them, Vic."

"We might be getting our very first godchild by the end of this week!" Vicky finishes.

"Wow! That's great!" beams Tammy.

"You guys are gonna be fairy godparents at last!" Tommy joins in.

"Woo-hoo!" The twins do synchronised mid-air backflips.

"Congratulations!" Valentina joins in. The rest of the family is dumbstruck. "What?"

Vicky squints at her. "Are you being sarcastic?"

"No! I'm genuinely happy for you guys."

"You know what this calls for?" Tammy holds her arms out. "A group hug!"

"Sorry, kid," her sister declines. "I'll happily lay off the sarcasm sometimes, but I draw the line at group hugs."

"Aw, come on!" The girl's eyes are big and shiny with unshed tears. They're the eyes Valentina can never resist.

"Let her have this," Timmy asks the teenager.

"Oh, all right." Valentina joins her parents and siblings.

As far as Tammy is concerned, hugs can never be too long. They're soft, they're warm, they're always with people you love … what's not to like about hugs?

When they break apart, Timmy asks his younger daughter, "What happened to your head?"

"Oh, nothing. I flew into a door. Clumsy old me."

There's a quiet, "Thanks," that only Tammy can hear.

…

"Timmy Turner."

The man in question opens his eyes and pricks up his ears. The sound is not repeated. It's probably nothing.

"Timmy Turner."

There it is again. "Vicky?" he answers. But the woman beside him is snoring away.

"Timmy Turner."

He sits up, searching the now-gloomy bedroom. Someone wants him. Who?

"Come here."

He slides out of bed, fumbling on the nightstand for his wand.

"Looking for something?"

His hand freezes. The yellow star on the end of his staff glints in a darkened corner.

How did it get over there?

That's not all. Two blood-red eyes peep out from the shadows. "Hello, darling."

Timmy tiptoes towards the source of the whispers. His throat is tight. _It's not her. It can't be. She's dead._

"Dee?"

He catches the ghost of a smile. "I'm back."

Timmy glances back at his wife. "Why are you here?"

"How can I leave you be?" she spits. "How can you expect me to go away, wandering alone through the universe friendless once more, pretending I never met you?"

Timmy doesn't answer. It's taking too much effort just remembering to breathe.

Dee goes on. "You're unforgettable. You're the one who pulled me from my miserable existence and brought me into the glow of real happiness. You're the one who gave me the hope of finally forging a meaningful friendship. You're my precious little light." The red eyes disappear for a second, possibly holding back tears, and then they return. "I want you, Timmy. And you want me, too."

"No, I don't." He clenches his fists.

"That's not what you said to me all those years ago." She mimics his scratchy young voice. "'I want you to be with me. I need you to look after me. I love you. Don't you love me?'"

The man cringes. "I never said anything like that."

"You did. I remember. I remember everything."

The Darkness leaps out at him. He yelps.

She clings to his hands. Her crepuscular form creeps across his skin and spreads up his arms.

She wants to transform him.

"Let go of me!" Timmy cries. "I have a wife and three kids now!" He tries to yank himself free; he fails.

"Can your wife and three kids give you _this_?"

There's a glimmer of a promise. He's sinking into her. They're becoming one. It's a beautiful feeling. It's bliss…

It's so tempting…

He shakes his head. He snaps out of it. "Don't I get a choice in this?"

"You have two choices: Go quietly now, or force me to destroy everything keeping you tied here."

She makes it sound as easy as putting on a shirt. How can the Darkness be so kind one minute and yet so cruel the next?

The layer of unlit film has reached his elbows. Timmy is frozen to the spot. Terror races through his mind. _What the heck do I do now?_

"You're evil," he splutters.

"Not for long," she counters. "When I flew away with you, I was the best I had ever been, because my sole purpose was to surround you with joy." She squeezes his hands so much they hurt. "Make me good again. Please. This is what friends do for each other, after all."

She emerges from her hiding-place.

"They make each other better."

He sees her hideous flaking skin, innards spewing out over her clothes. He sees her deranged expression, her wide eyes and furrowed brows. And reflected in those dense pupils, he sees himself, ten years old again, darkening, darkening, fading into nothingness with a smile on his face.

" _NO!_ "

He frees himself.

He falls back on the bed.

Vicky's lamp flickers into life.

"Timmy?" She scrapes the sleep from her eyes. "What are you doing? It's three in the morning."

"Vicky!" He scrambles over his wife, blocking her view of the threat. "Vicky, you have to get out. It's not safe here."

"What are you talking about?"

"Just go! And take the kids!" His eyes dart between her and the enemy. "I'm trying to protect you!"

"From what?"

"From-" He does a double take. "Where'd she go? She was right here."

" _Who_ was right here?" Vicky sits up. "Did you just have some crazy nightmare?"

"I – I'm sure she – but – well, I guess I did."

She examines the object of his wild gaze: an empty, unlit space. "About the Darkness?"

"Uh-huh." He barely regards the woman beside him. "More light. We need more light."

With a wave of Vicky's wand, the room is bathed in a piercing cyan illumination, bright enough to sear her retinas. "That light enough for you, scaredy-cat?"

Timmy scrutinises the bedroom. "Good. She's gone." He settles down under the covers. "We'll just have to keep the whole house like this so she doesn't come back."

"How do you expect us to sleep when it's so bright?" The grumpy wife undoes her spell with a huff.

"TURN THE LIGHTS BACK ON!"

"Shut up, you'll wake the kids!" But Vicky obliges. Her husband tightly grips the quilt, holding it like a shield; she strokes the white knuckles. "You're pretty shaken up." She attempts to comfort him. "Chill out, Timmy. It was just a bad dream."

"You didn't see her! You didn't-" He sobs.

He's a wreck. He's regressed to the state of a child, trembling, crying, cowering under the sheets. He thought he'd moved past it. He thought he was more than just 'the guy that killed the Darkness and saved the world'. He thought the childhood hauntings had stopped. Evidently, he was wrong.

He's a grown man, and he's afraid of the dark. How pathetic is that?

The door creaks open, and all three Turner kids enter. "What's the hubbub?" Tommy asks with a yawn.

"Your father had a nightmare about the Darkness," Vicky tells them.

Timmy sits up. "But I'm okay now. Go back to bed." There's an ill-timed smile. You can't show any weakness in front of your kids.

Tammy moves round to the foot of the bed. "You'll be fine," she assures her father. "If the Darkness wants you, it'll have to go through me first."

Valentina pouts. "What can you do? You're just a kid."

"A _fairy_ kid. And fairy kids have a lot of tricks up their sleeves."

To prove her point, Tammy shoots out a pink ray. There's a massive _BANG!_ The entire outside wall is decimated. Cool air whooshes in and displaces a few more bricks.

"Wow," Valentina breathes.

Timmy chuckles.

"What's so funny? I'm serious!" Tammy smacks her wand into her palm. "If that thing comes near you-"

"Relax, sport." He teases the talisman from her stubborn fingers and makes the wall ping back to normal. "You don't have to defend me. I can take care of myself. And it was just a dream, anyway." This time, his smile is real. "I appreciate the thought, though. Now, let's all try to get some sleep."

…

It was no dream.

She's still there, lurking in the corner, confined to the night.

She's always there.

For as long as the Sun sets and lengthens the shadows, she will be there. For as long as people reluctantly turn off the lights as the moon rises, she will be there. For as long as Timmy Turner refuses to acknowledge her presence, she will be there.

She can never be truly happy if seeing him is forbidden. She can never be at peace if he is not inside her. She can never become the kind of person she is meant to be if she doesn't have Timmy spurring her on. The pain of his rejection is worse than that of the uncountable weapons which have previously lacerated her – worse, even, than the smouldering blaze he sent streaming through her at the concert.

Once in a blue moon, life throws you an opportunity to fulfil your dreams, and it's up to you to take it. She had her chance thirty years ago, and she blew it.

Fortunately, the Darkness is nothing if not patient. Fairies have been known to live forever, so if it takes her another ten thousand years to recapture her Chosen One and mend her broken heart, so be it.

She'll do whatever it takes to rekindle her little light.

 **THE END**

 **Author's Note: To finish, here are some quotes I thought were fitting to this story:**

" _The truth is, everyone is going to hurt you. You just got to find the ones worth suffering for."_

Bob Marley

" _But being chosen doesn't make you a hero; what you choose does."_

Batman, _Batman: The Brave and the Bold_

" _Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you."_

Friedrich Nietzsche


End file.
